Tracks

Explosions

Why You Don’t Mess With Fuel Cell Foam

2013-04-26 dr. diandra 3

We’d been hearing rumors of penalties stemming from Kansas and everyone expected them to be announced Tuesday. Since penalties usually have some scientific component, I was sort of hoping for some new material. Tuesday came and went. Nothing. Wednesday, all heck broke loose as penalties were announced for the No 20 JGR car (engine issues) and the No 98 ThorSport truck.
The more interesting — and less discussed — penalty is the ThorSport/Johnny Sauter one. (It was a tough week for Wisconsin drivers). The team was docked 25 points, which is pretty huge for the Truck Series and the crew chief fined $10,000. (I realize that seems small when compared to the Sprint Cup Series penalties, but the Truck Series has correspondingly lower purses and salaries.) […]

Bristol Motor Speedway

Why Turning is Hard

2013-04-20 dr. diandra 4

Why Turning Fast is Hard If Isaac Newton had been a racing fan (which I’m sure Sir Isaac would have been if had cars been invented in the 1600’s), he might have stated one of […]

Almquist, Kirk

Memories of Martinsville

2013-04-06 dr. diandra 2

Martinsville is my favorite track and it has absolutely nothing to do with the hot dogs.  It’s a short, flat track out in the middle of nowhere.  It doesn’t have the high speeds and pack […]

Auto Club Speedway of California

Making New Race Fans, One at a Time

2013-03-26 dr. diandra 3

I got a call out of the blue in the office yesterday. A biomedical physicist/radiation oncologist from UC-Irvine who had just gone to his first NASCAR race at Auto Club Speedway had a question about my book, The Physics of NASCAR (which, by the way, you don’t have to be a physicist to read. In fact, it’s probably better if you’re not.) […]

Aerodynamic Forces

From the Lab Notebook: Las Vegas and the Mysteriously Missing Oil Tank Cover

2013-03-06 dr. diandra 1

As we head for Las Vegas this weekend, I thought I’d repost on of my most popular posts from stockcarscience.com on 3/5/2008 since the redirects for the old stockcarscience.com site don’t work reliably. The post is about Carl Edwards’ 2008 win at Las Vegas when the team was subsequently fined for having their oil tank cover lid askew at the end of the race. I have edited the post extensively, adding some new information and better graphics. […]

Auto Club Speedway of California

Degrees of Difference: How is Martinsville like Fontana?

2012-10-25 dr. diandra 3

I love getting questions from readers because I always worry that the geeky stuff I find interesting is only interesting to me.  I love it even more when they not only give me a question, […]

Asphalt

Dover: Why Concrete Races Differently than Asphalt

2012-09-28 dr. diandra 18

One of the questions you’ll hear drivers and crew chiefs asked a lot this weekend at Dover is how the concrete track affects the racing. Here’s how: […]

Richmond

Infographic: Does Kasey Kahne Get in the Chase?

2012-09-04 dr. diandra 3

I don’t know if they still make you do flowcharts in programming class, but I was trying to read through the Chase scenarios and I was getting really confused. So I did this. I think it’s much clearer now. To me, at least.
I bet I can get the other scenarios on here… Watch this space! […]

Engines

Why is Michigan so Hard on Engines?

2012-08-23 dr. diandra 3

Four Hendrick Motorsports engines failed at Michigan International Speedway . But Michigan is hard on engines. Let’s see why. […]

Pocono

Lightning Safety at Racetracks

2012-08-08 dr. diandra 1

A little late with this because I have been in New York City at a meeting.  It was an important enough meeting that I missed the race on Sunday.  I was sad to read Monday […]