Australian V8 Supercars Now Using Overtake Button!

It was one year ago that the innovation of a power boost feature on Indy race cars was introduced. The system that requires a turbo-charged engine, boosts the car's power output from 5 to 20 bhp for a limited time. The range in boosted output is based upon whether the engine is set to run a rich or lean fuel mixture (a lean fuel mix will yield up to 20 bhp while a rich mix will result in around 5 bhp since the engine is already set-up close to optimum output). The power boost feature can only be used a total of 20 times during a race and includes a 10 second delay between uses.

The "push to pass" system has resulted in some interesting race strategies concerning whether the system should be used to overtake another car (offensively) or used to prevent other competitors from overtaking you (defensively).

The following video was produced last weekend prior to the Indy Edmonton race by one of Versus Television's race announcers, Jack Arute. Arute talks strategy concerning the Edmonton track. It gives us a good idea of how this innovation is making the Indy car circuit quite a bit more interesting...

While researching this piece I ran headlong into a similar feature now being used in the Australian V8 Supercars' circuit. In the following video you'll learn how Greg Murphy uses this system while overtaking the competition...

Since NASCAR continues using carburetors making the Indy car power boost system unworkable, perhaps they need to take a hard look at the Australian version of the "Overtake Button"!

Resource: http://www.crash.net/indycar/news/150529/1/indycar_series_introduces_push_to_pass.html

NASCAR News with Indy in the look back...

Jamie McMurray wins the Brickyard 400!

The Tampa Bay Rays’ oldest starting pitcher is James Shields at 28 years of age.
Shields’ claim to fame is the ability to bring his game up a notch when faced with stiff competition. Apparently Jamie McMurray fits that same mold as he seems to rise to the occasion too. For this reason I’m going to borrow James Shields’ nickname and lay it on Jamie McMurray… BIG GAME JAMES! So far in 2010, BIG GAME has won the two most lucrative race purses on the NASCAR schedule, the Daytona 500 with a 2010 total purse of $16,280,466 and the Brickyard 400 with a 2010 total purse of $8,055,895. In those two wins, McMurray brought in a total of $1,947,826 or just over 8% of the two race total.

Not too shabby there BIG GAME!

Eleventh place is the best you can do?

HMS has problems at Indy.

Mark Martin ended a long day for Hendrick Motorsports at the Brickyard 400 by placing 11th, eleven places ahead of Hendrick’s second place finisher Jimmie Johnson in 22nd. Jeff Gordon, klvalus’ new favorite driver, came in 23rd while Dale Earnhardt Jr. was taken out as an innocent bystander when Juan Pablo Montoya’s run for the checkered flag came up short once again. A four tire pit stop left Juan back in the pack, this after Montoya accumulated 86 laps leading the race. Gotta love that road rage Gene! As a result, Junior came in a distant 27th. Gordon was never comfortable in his ride while Jimmie seemed to be taking one step forward and two steps back the whole race…

Junior in the wrong place when things went bad for Montoya...

This is very unfamiliar territory for Rick Hendrick and with Pocono on the immediate horizon things may not improve too much next weekend.

Who came up with this racing trifecta anyway?

Yeah, yeah, Ganassi Racing won the Daytona 500, the Indianapolis 500 and now the Brickyard 400 in the same year, but who else is in a position to do such a thing? Penske is the only other team to come to mind so what’s the big deal? Why not have a trifecta where every team has a chance at winning it? Personally I think NASCAR should put together an “In-house” trifecta if it’s such a big deal or better yet, a Grand Slam of NASCAR and throw in an incentive of a million bucks or so to anyone who can win it in one racing season. That might stir up some interest. Now, which four races would be logical? First off you’ve gotta have the Daytona 500. Next could be Charlotte’s Coca Cola 600 followed by Bristol’s Irwin Tools 500 lap night race in the stadium and then to put the finishing touch on it, Talladega’s Amp Energy 500. Daytona's 200 laps on the 2.5 mile tri-oval, the 400 laps of 1.5 mile quad-oval racing at Charlotte, Bristol’s 500 laps on the .533 mile stadium oval and finally 500 miles on the Talladega Superspeedway! Got a better idea?

Daytona 500 in February------------------------------------------------Coca Cola 600 in early July

Bristol's 500 laps of night racing in late August-----------------------------------------------Talladega's Amp Energy 500 at the end of October.

You listening Mr. France?

Kyle Busch spins his way to an 8th place finish on the bricks

Love him or hate him, what Kyle pulled off at Indy on Sunday was truly something given the type of line dancing the Indianapolis Motor Speedway spawns. After spinning out of control on the green track during the first lap of the Brickyard 400, Kyle and his crew put together a quiet, steady and consistent run that placed him in the top ten at the end.

NASCAR News…

A spokesman for NASCAR confirmed Monday that the nation’s foremost auto race sanctioning organization had fined at least two of its most prominent drivers for making critical comments concerning the Sprint Cup racing series. The Associated Press granted anonymity to the people who spoke to them. NASCAR is not making public the top driver’s names. It’s thought that one driver in particular was fined 50 grand… The NASCAR spokesman, Ramsey Poston, stated it was a move to protect the sport’s brand.

My two cents: Why the fines? Considering the current financial woes and some of the moves already made and others that NASCAR may institute in 2011, it seems to me they should welcome a public airing of what’s perceived to be the sport’s problems. This should be especially true of the people that have a vested interest in seeing the sport succeed.

After 20 races in the 2010 NASCAR Sprint Cup season,

here are the average team earnings standings:

---------------------------# of
-----Team------Earnings ----Teams Ave./Team
1----EGR ------$7,452,138 ----2 --$3,726,069
2----HMS -----$13,222,919 ----4 --$3,305,730
3----RCR ------$9,817,673 ----3 --$3,272,558
4----JGR ------$9,729,844 ----3 --$3,243,281
5----Front R---$6,131,437 ----2 --$3,065,719
6----SHR ------$5,925,143 ----2 --$2,962,572
7----RFR -----$11,200,143 ----4 --$2,800,036
8----Penske ---$8,042,833 ----3 --$2,680,944
9----RPM ------$7,917,588 ----3 --$2,639,196
10---Daughrty--$2,440,198 ----1 --$2,440,198
11---Red Bull--$4,700,617 ----2 --$2,350,309
12---MWR-------$6,861,852 ----3 --$2,287,284
13---Phoenix --$2,190,056 ----1 --$2,190,056
14---RGM-------$2,168,811 ----1 --$2,168,811
15---Furn. R---$2,034,105 ----1 --$2,034,105
16---NEMCO ----$1,665,410 ----1 --$1,665,410
17---Latitude -$1,583,695 ----1 --$1,583,695
18---Germain --$1,461,444 ----1 --$1,461,444
19---Prism ----$1,260,906 ----1 --$1,260,906
20---Wood Br. ---$828,020 ----1 ----$828,020
21---Baldwin --$1,472,905 ----2 ----$736,453
22---TRG ------$1,438,910 ----2 ----$719,455
23---Whitney ----$601,195 ----1 ----$601,195
24---Gunselman --$492,745 ----1 ----$492,745
25---Keyed-Up ----$72,575 ----1 -----$72,575

Earnhardt-Ganassi Racing, on the strength of BIG GAME JAMES’ two BIG wins, has solidified its position at the front…

Are You Ready to Rock?

Maybe it’s the mid-summer heat. I want everything on the rocks!

So… How about a few of the rocks I’ve had the pleasure to have gazed upon…

The Grandeur of the Sierra Nevada Mountain Range

Tehipiti Dome, Kings Canyon National Park, Central Sierra Nevada Mountains…

This granite monolithic dome rises 3,000 feet above Tehipite Valley... An 18 mile hike to get to great Rainbow fishing in the King's River there.

Devil’s Postpile National Monument, Central Sierra Nevada Mountains…

Layer upon layer of lava flows made this unique basalt formation in eastern Madera County.

Half Dome, Yosemite National Park, Central Sierra Nevada Mountains…

Probably the most famous of the Central Sierra domes. In the old days the Park Service put on a real show on summer nights with the Fire Fall from Yosimite's Glacier Point...

The practice was meant to compliment the many water falls around Yosimite Valley and as you can see it was quite an attraction. The park became too popular and the Fire Fall was discontinued to discourage the huge crowds...

Moro Rock, Sequoia National Park, Central Sierra Nevada Mountains…

I've been to the top of Moro Rock many times to look across the Kaweah River Valley below while up above I could gaze upon the High Sierras that reach 14,000 feet above sea level.

The Glorious West

Morro Rock, Morro Bay, California, Central Coast

A huge rock planted in the beach that forms the bay of the same name... Many a time in the grey of the morning did I ride with Virg in one of his party boats headed out past Morro Rock for some deep sea fishing.

The Northern California Coast...

If you're ever able to drive Highway 1 and 101 along the Pacific Coast scenes like this are commonplace... You can basically follow the coast from Washington all the way to San Diego. A nice leisurely four day drive oughta do it!

Hole in the Mountain Peak, Ruby Mountains Nevada

Just below the summit it looks like someone took a huge drill bit and bored a hole through the granite.
The Ruby Mountains, a beautiful range of mountains east of Elko, Nevada...

Sedona Arizona’s Red Rock Mountains

The Red Rock Country is truly a spiritual experience... It's little wonder why many of our nation's most highly respected artists have spent time in this part of the country.

Monument Valley, Arizona

Can't you just see John Wayne leading the cavalry across that scene?

Petrified Forest, Arizona

Hard Rock Candy Mountains?

Coyote Butte, Arizona

If you listen you can here the pack howling...

Arches National Park, Utah

Bryce Canyon National Park, Utah

Reminds me of a Gothic Cathedral... They need to move the Mormon Tabernacle Choir's huge pipe organ in here and give a concert...

Bryce Canyon deserves another look...

What can I say?

Zion National Park, Utah

These scenes of such beauty are from only a small corner of our Earth... A corner I've been lucky enough to enjoy. Someday I hope to see them all again.

Did you rock out???

The Sunday Funnies

Like the bumper sticker says, Baby I'm Bored!

Nothing like a little humor to straighten that out, get your smile workin' and just maybe make ya feel good about bein' alive!

If I offend anyone, what can I say?

First off, The Blonde Antelope...



You like Pandas? This is funny...



Another blonde moment...



And finally, if you haven't seen the skateboarding bulldog, here ya go!



Feel better? I do...

V is for ???????

I woke up this morning and had to admit that I’d been so busy with other issues that I completely forgot today was the first day of “The Open”. I prepared a cup of coffee then flipped on the television for my morning sports fix, and wallah! It’s a gray, overcast day on the coast of Scotland. Ah! It’s the Old Course at St. Andrews! And look who’s there! No doubt about it, I got to shout it, it’s Tiger Woods!

Ya know, somehow he looks older… I guess it doesn’t take a Harvard Law degree to figure out why, but considering some of the individuals in high places that actually do have such a degree and looking at some of the ridiculous things they’ve been doing, I better rethink that one. Let’s put it this way, you better have better than a Harvard Law degree to figure that one out. Rhodes Scholar? Hmmmm…

Anyway, so here’s the one and only Tiger and he’s not doing too badly given the pitch and run nature of the course (pasture?). Then there’s those huge rolling greens that can only be distinguished from the fairway because there’s a flag on a pole stuck in a cup there…

Tiger’s doing all right and he should, he’s won this prestigious tournament twice on the St. Andrews links. But that was back in the old days, back when the people of golf nation virtually worshipped the ground he walked on (myself included).

The TV coverage team got a close up of Tiger on the screen and I pay attention. He’s
concentrating, studying a putt he’s about to make. He’s wearing an unusual outfit (at least I’ve never seen him wear it or a similar one before). A horizontally striped shirt of varying shades of pink and, of course, the Nike check mark logo over his heart. Is Tiger trying to make a statement? Never seen him in pink before… The connotations are obvious in my mind. He’s now perceived as a cheater, a sneak, an adulterer, and on and on, and here he is wearing the universally recognized color of femininity. They say real men aren’t worried about what other people may think. They’ll wear pink if they damn well want to… Is that what Tiger’s saying? He’s a real man? Or is he simply appealing to women to forgive him. Hard to say, but here he is wearing an outfit none of us have ever seen him wear on one of golf’s biggest stages.

Another thing I noticed concerning Tiger’s attire this morning, although I have seen him wear this over the last year or so, he’s got a fairly large V embroidered on the left side of his ball cap. Like I say, I’ve seen it before and knew he was being paid to have it on his hat, but never questioned what it stood for. After seeing him evidently making a statement of some kind with that pink shirt, I started wondering what the V was all about…

Let’s see… The most unoriginal answer: V is for Victory! Naw, that’s too easy.

Since the war in Viet Nam holding up two fingers in the “V” sign has stood for peace… Sure, that’s something we all wish for, but on a golf cap? Nope, that’s not it.

Hmmmm… Considering what Tiger’s been through since last November I really doubt that he’s begun advertising for Viagara, but who knows? Maybe all those women wore him out and now he requires something like that, so why not add a few bucks to Fort Knox and advertise? No… That’s too much of a stretch (pun intended).

Okay, maybe, just maybe he figures two children are enough. Since he obviously likes to mess around (ahem)… Maybe he went and got a vasectomy! He’s so proud of it he wants everyone to know he’s doing his part for population control by putting that V on his cap (plus it’s a great way to go trolling… Have babe, I’m safe!). Maybe not…

Tired of wondering about it I went on-line to my trusty Google search engine and plugged in “V on Tiger Woods' hat” and got right down to the answer…

Guess what?

"V" IS for Victory!

That’s what Nike named their new line of irons!

Hope those clubs do the trick for the crouching Tiger

because he's got a young lion (Britain's Rory McIlroy the opening day leader at 9 under par)

and a hidden dragon (Japan's Ryo Ishikawa who is tied for fifth at 4 under par) stalking him now…

A Mid-Season Numbers Diversion

Well, we’re halfway through the 2010 NASCAR season and I thought it makes sense to take a hard look at what has transpired, by the numbers.

First off, here are the current Top 20 Chase Standing Drivers:
(thru the July 10th race in Joliet, Illinois)

I wonder how these standings would look if we made just one slight change to the system… Let’s award the drivers one point for every lap they’ve led during the first 19 races of the season:

It surprised me that after adding almost 6,000 points to the standings mix the results really didn’t change that much. The major difference being the larger gap between the top drivers. In the current system 400 points separate first from tenth place while in the revised system (which I believe rewards drivers to a higher level for not sitting on their laurels) the gap between first and tenth grew to over 500 points more to 954. Kasey Kahne would been the recepient of the most benefit from the revised system. Kasey made a leap from 17th to 10th in the Chase while Carl Edwards (with only four, that’s right, count 'em only four lead laps in 19 races!) drops out. The revised point system reshuffled the leading drivers with le creme de le creme rising to the top.

So far 64 drivers have driven a Sprint Cup car this season but only 46 have taken the lead at any one time. Here are the top twenty-five:

Look at all the drivers up there with more laps led than Carl Edwards. There are another 13 (including Boris Said and Mattias Ekstrom, two road course drivers) before you find Uncle Carl with 4…

Kristen, you oughta like those stats!

The problem is NASCAR wants to know how that damned Dodge is doin' it!

And Jon, did you see that Joe Nemechek has actually led two(!) laps!

Along the lines of the start and park folks, here are the top drivers in terms of laps completed per start followed by the drivers who are constantly breaking down (or is it wrecking?)...

Taking the laps led data one step further. Here’s how the teams stack up:

The average laps led per team is really telling...

And then look at laps led by Manufacturer:

---MAKE-------------LAPS LED------#of TEAMS-------AVE./TEAM
1. Dodge ---------------875---------------4 -----------------218.75
2. Chevrolet----------2,919 -------------17------------------171.71
3. Toyota ------------1,453 -------------14------------------103.79
4. Ford----------------554 -------------12------------------46.17

What’s up with Ford? Now I know these people have got great engineers making great equipment for an excellent group of drivers, so what gives? This is way out of line.

________________________________________

How about a look at where the rubber really meets the road – The Money:

(Here are the top drivers in terms of total earnings and then average earnings per start)

Out of these numbers came a surprise. Look at which team is out-performing all others where it counts:

Evidently Earnhardt-Ganassi Racing is gettin' the hits when they need to, when the big money is on the line... Those teams averaging better than $2.5 million (if that $5 million figure is accurate these days) will be running a profitable operation if they continue through the rest of the year as they have the first half.

____________________________________________

In a different look at numbers, here is a rating of the drivers in terms of starting position and finishing position:

(35 Drivers with over 4,000 laps of racing were used)

Here are the top 10 drivers moving through the field toward a good finish in 2010 ---------Drivers moving up took the following numbers off of their starting positions:

1.-----Kevin Harvick -9.737
2.-----Travis Kvapil -9.556
3.-----Kevin Conway -8.222
4.-----Matt Kenseth -7.368
5.-----Robby Gordon -6.706
6.-----David Gilliland -6.125
7.------Carl Edwards -4.947
8.----Bobby Labonte -3.579
9.---------Greg Biffle -3.526
10.----Denny Hamlin -3.368

-------Then there are the drivers moving down. Add the following numbers to their starting positions and that's where they've been finishing:

26.---Marcos Ambrose 2.737
27.---------Joe Logano 3.842
28.------Mark Martin 4.053
29.--Jamie McMurray 4.579
30.-------Kurt Busch 4.842
31.---Sam Hornish Jr. 5.053
32.----Ryan Newman 5.737
33.--Jimmie Johnson 5.789
34.-----Kasey Kahne 6.895
35.-Juan Pablo Montoya 7.053

Looking at these numbers makes me wonder what EGR could be doing money-wise with a driver that moves up, not down (sounds like one of those gold commercials... And it's supposed to!) When's Juan's contract run out?

Finally, Here is how the top drivers have performed in terms of finishes:

Is it going to be more of the same or will someone named Kevin or Kurt of Kyle or Tony or ???? break the spell?

Time will tell...

There will be more number crunching in the future... Hope you have enjoyed this look at what our boys are doing.

I do want to apologize for the quality of those spreadsheets. Someday maybe they'll figure out how to tranfer that kind of work to a blog... For a number cruncher like me it would sure be nice!