Cue Gene Kelly singing a slightly different tune.
It took us 22 weeks, but we finally had our first rain out of the season after a close call at Pocono.
This of course moves the race to Monday on ESPN – a notably smaller audience and reach. In recent years this wouldn’t have been a problem for the Nationwide Series. Rain tires, windshield wipers and brake light have gotten the job done. For the Cup Series though, that option doesn’t exist. This delay has raised the inevitable question of why what’s good enough for the Nationwide Series is not good enough for the Cup Series.
And this morning, as you peruse the NASCAR press, there are a lot of opinions about the use of rain tires in the Cup Series – a move that would have kept the Series in it’s prime TV slot and maintained the audience.
NASCAR Vice President Robin Pemberton said:
“We feel at this level, it really throws a wild card in there… Our guys, we’re a series that doesn’t have experience on rain tires. It’s a lot to put on them. Nowadays the championships are so close and making the Chase is so close, it’s a lot of pressure to put on one race at this stage of the season.“
The fact is, he’s right. The series never has raced on rain tires and it would be nothing short of risky to put them out there under the present circumstances. Should preparations have been made for such a scenario though?
Obviously rain tires on an oval are out of the question. But the Nationwide Series has proven, if not with mixed results, that it can work on a stock car. It’s true that the racing is rough, sloppy and frankly not very good, but it is possible.
For NASCAR though ensuring the quality of the racing has to be a top priority. We’ve seen in the past when things have gone wrong and the damage it can do to the sport and to the venue hosting – I point you to the tire fiasco at Indianapolis in 2008.
Is it better to have a race because we can? Or should we be ensuring the conditions are optimal for the race we want?
I’ll admit, I thought some of Pemberton’s excuses were shaky. But I don’t necessarily think this is a bad policy for NASCAR. The races we’ve run in the rain have been entertaining only for the novelty of the event. I know I’d rather see a delayed good race on Monday than a forced bad race on Sunday.
Tell us what you think! Would you like to see the Cup Series on rain tires? Do you wish we’d raced on Sunday instead of Monday? Let us know.
By the way, check out the race at noon 10 am on ESPN.
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