Homestead question

nogoats

nogoats

Member
NASCAR races at Homestead are great with four-wide racing, lots of passing and plenty of lines to run. Why aren't more of the NASCAR tracks designed like this?
 
it took them 3 tries to get it this way.i watched this speedway come from nursery farm to racetrack as i only lived 5 miles from it.the land was owned by a friends dad and the first few years drivers were so scared they would not run full tilt at all. and they didn't change it right after John Nemechek was killed but after Mike Skinner hit the wall in the very same spot the next year they started considering changes.just happened to be talking to Richard Childress at the moment Skinner hit the wall.i can't repeat what he said but was very upset and woriied about his driver.it is a very nice racing facility and was way ahead of the other tracks in fan experience it set the new standard for new and old tracks.Lots of good memories down there and lots of friends creating memories there this weekend.
 
First it was a flat rectangle (supposed to remind us if Indy). Then it was still flat but an oval. Then banked. The banking is progressive, so up by the wall it's about two degrees more banking than down on the white line, maybe more?

I agree, it makes for great racing!
 
This progressive-banking concept doesn't work in all applications: i.e. Bristol. Running a racetrack nowadays is much different than it was in the late '90's. Back then, you were trying to figure out how to pack more seats into your facility, while now you're trying to tread water and find alternative ways to use your venue. Everyone doesn't have Bruton Smith's capital to reconfigure their tracks.
 
the cookie cutters killed great tracks... and homestead was a disaster at its start... like the track at Disney - is that still running anything? we know florida is flat, but trying to create a track based on the existing topography was not a great idea. gee what happened to NH... was a flat track too.... they're all gone. the great small tracks like N Wilkesboro and odd tracks like Darlington... Nascar took variety out of the tracks, which made the races unique and a challenge to team, crew and driver... parity destroyed the competition, cookie cutters took the tracks.

done, soap box available to the next speaker.
 
Character and raceability (did I just make up a word?) are not traits that were acknowledged during the building boom in NASCAR. "Venue" was all the rage, with California and Chicagoland, trying to sew up the large markets. Well, after all the new wore off, these "flavor of the month" fans in the large markets abandoned the sport as just another designer coffee, and the sanctioning body had already outpriced its core audience as well as closing their local tracks. Factor in the billion-dollar network TV deals, and NASCAR has found itself among other sports we would rather watch from home instead of paying hundreds to see in person.
 
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