The 2024 spring Martinsville lead change preview shows lead-change variations throughout the last three generations of the NASCAR race car. This information provides necessary perspective for understanding this week’s race results.
Short Tracks in 2024
Martinsville is the fourth one-mile-and-under track on the 2024 NASCAR schedule, but it’s only the second real test of NASCAR’s new short-track package. I focus on lead changes here, as that is one of the primary metrics NASCAR fans cite as measures of a ‘good’ race.
Short Tracks to Date
- Phoenix was, well, pretty typical Phoenix. There were some rises in lead changes, but it was pretty unremarkable.
- Bristol doesn’t use the new short-track/road course package. The tire weirdness makes data from that race useless for comparisons.
- Richmond was the first real test of the new package at tracks under a mile in length. The results were mixed to disappointing.
- The 16 total lead changes are down from 18 in fall 2023 and 22 in spring 2023.
- Out of those 16 lead changes, only two were green-flag passes. Two were leads taken on restarts. Both green-flag passes happened in stage one on wet-weather tires. The other 12 lead changes happened during pit stops, either because a driver gave up the lead to pit, or a driver won the lead on pit road.
- The 2813 overall green-flag passes at Richmond are a big jump from 2201 last fall and 2584 last fall. Unfortunately, I have no way to break out how many of those passes came during the first stage on wet-weather tires.
- The 20 green-flag passes for the lead is more than the 18 last fall, but fewer than the 35 racked up in 2023’s spring race.
Martinsville Lead Change History
Interpreting results for the 2024 spring Martinsville race requires understanding what’s ‘normal’ for Martinsville. The graph below shows lead changes over the stage-racing era.
- The Gen-6 stage-racing era of 2017-2021 shows a huge variation in lead changes from a high of 20 to a low of three.
- Next Gen races have increased from five lead changes in spring of 2022 to 12 last fall. The Next Gen numbers aren’t as high as those with the Gen-6 car; however, they’re also not as low.
Backing up to the introduction of the Gen-5 or ‘Car of Tomorrow’ shows an even larger difference. The Gen-5 car (2007 to 2012) never produced fewer than 12 lead changes and once had 31 lead changes.
The Gen-5 car actually marked the high point in lead changes. Prior to its introduction, there had never been more than 22 lead changes at Martinsville.
Martinsville Green-Flag Passes for the Lead
The number of green-flag passes for the lead is an overlooked stat. It’s a tiny line of the overall box score, but it can be useful. This number measures all passes for the lead, not just the drivers leading at the start/finish line each lap.
Last year’s races had more green-flag passes for the lead than any other races in the stage-racing era at Martinsville. They are a significant improvement over the 2022 numbers, suggesting that perhaps teams have learned more about the car.
Looking back a little further in time shows that the Gen-5 car again produced more green-flag passes for the lead than the Gen-6 or Gen-7 cars did. Note that the rear wing was removed and replaced with a spoiler in 2010 — that’s when the numbers really started to rise.
My Takeaways
- Given how reviled the Gen-5 car was, it’s amusing to see how much better numbers it posted than either of its successors.
- Looking back on the history of each new car as it was introduced, drivers always complained that it was harder to pass. The intensity of driver feedback seems uncorrelated with hard statistics like lead change numbers.
- Even within periods of relatively stable rules, the number vary quite a bit. That makes it doubly hard to decide what the numbers mean. Is the new package a failure, or was this just one of those boring races that happens every so often?
- Are the decreases due to inherent properties of the cars or are they simply the result of the equipment similarities causing tighter competition? And how would one test that?
That’s the 2024 spring Martinsville lead change preview. I’ll be reporting this weekend from the racetrack. If you have any questions you’d like answered from a technical perspective, leave it in the comments!
Dr. D. – although there is no way to verify it, I honestly believe that races are judged as “good or bad” based more on perception than data. It’s not a question of the number of green flag passes; rather, it is a question of how much passing is shown on TV. FOX seems to focus for long periods of time on the leader, or the top two or three cars, rather than showing what is often good racing back through the field. NBC is more inclined to show races for position, wherever they are occurring. I’ve been to more than 40 races in the past 25 years and only two were mind-numbingly bad – the first Bristol night race with the COT and a Richmond race probably 10 years ago. In both cases, the top 10 or 12 stayed the same all night. In the Richmond race, the highlight was a guy climbing the catch fence. I’m looking forward to your data, but I think the TV production may be the X factor here. Thanks for all you do.
I think you are correct about how people perceive races. That’s one reason I’m focusing on the stats. Often, people complain that there wasn’t enough passing, even though the passing numbers refuted that.
If the problem is the way the races are presented and NASCAR’s fix is changing the cars, then we’ve got a mismatch and the problem will never be solved. In part, I think it’s training newer and casual fans to appreciate the things that someone like you appreciates. For others, it’s just showing them that what they’re saying is wrong because they’re being trained by social media and elsewhere to look for things to complain about.
And I remember the guy on the catchfence at Richmond! How much do you have to drink to think that’s a good idea?
I don’t think I could ever get drunk enough to climb a catch fence – but that’s just me. 😎 I agree with your other points and think the problem is as much fan education as anything on the track. After all, look at how many people watch F1 – and they may only have a dozen passes for the lead in the entire season.