Chase Elliott
2024 Winners: By the Numbers
The NASCAR championship format doesn’t necessarily reward the driver who wins the most races in a season. It’s far more important WHEN a driver wins, as Joey Logano showed this year. […]
math
DNFs
2024 Completion Rates: By the Numbers
The total NASCAR schedule, including overtimes and shortened races, added up to 126,449.9 miles and 9,744 laps. But no driver actually ran every mile or every lap. […]
math
2024 Laps and Miles: By The Numbers
Building Speed’s 2024 By The Numbers feature starts with a look at the Laps and Miles run in 2024. The big story in that department this year was the weather. Despite Mother Nature dissing stock cars, we managed to get in a surprising portion of the scheduled racing. […]
Cautions
2024 Iowa Race Report
The 2024 Iowa race report has some edgy tires, a disaster for both Kyles and the first win of the season for defending champion Ryan Blaney. So let’s get to it! Caution- and Lead-O-Gram We […]
Lead Changes
Counting Lead Changes Through the First ‘x’ Races is Meaningless
The hoo-rah being made over the large number of lead changes in the NASCAR Cup Series through the first 11 races of the 2024 season is artificial. It’s an accident of schedule changes and tire weirdness at Bristol. Counting lead change numbers by themselves doesn’t mean anything unless you consider where the numbers come from. […]
Aerodynamics
2024 Spring Martinsville Lead Change Preview
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. […]
2023
2023 Stats Overview: Penalty Numbers
The 2023 Stats Overview: Penalty Numbers summarizes the overall number and types of penalties incurred in NASCAR’s 2023 season. Teams generated a total of 741 total penalties, but not all were accidental. Last year, I […]
2023
2023 Stats Overview: Days Raced
The first entry in the 2023 Stats Overview is Days Raced, which surveys the days races started. Note that races delayed a day by weather aren’t included here. Also, I only include points races in this survey. […]
Drivers
Elite Drivers After Their Last Wins
@KudzuCarl read my article for NBC Sports about how many races elite drivers ran after their last win. He suggested using finishing position as a metric, which is a great idea. […]
2022
More-Experienced Drivers Fared Worse with the Next Gen Car: Season Rankings
From the start of the 2022 season, veteran NASCAR Cup Series drivers fared worse with the Next Gen car much more than their less-experienced counterparts. Some drivers, like Denny Hamlin, seemed to come to grips with the car in the later portions of the season. Others didn’t. […]