Electronic Fuel Injection

Not Fine with Me!

C’mon NASCAR – I keep trying to defend you and you keep making it hard for me.

@jeff_gluck reports that @nateryan told Brian France that NASCAR seems like

“…an autocratic regime that doles out punishment in a capricious manner.”

While I agree with those sentiments entirely, a slightly different word comes to my mind: “chicken%$!#” […]

IndyCar
Edwards, Carl

Ray Evernham on Carbon Monoxide

Ray Evernham was one of the first people who realized the carbon monoxide (CO) has an effect on driver that could be affecting his performance. “(I could tell immediately) …by the way Jeff answers me […]

math

How Likely are You to Win the TNT Million Dollar Challenge?

TNT is offering a million dollars to anyone who picks the top ten drivers – in order – at any of the six NASCAR races they broadcast. You have up until 25% of the race has been run to lock in your selections, which means up to mile 100 at Daytona this weekend. How likely are you to win? […]

math

100 Million vs. 78 Million is not the Numbers Question for FOX vs SPEED

The NASCAR pundits have again simplified a complex situation. Incorrectly.

The NASCAR Net is a-twitter since FOX floated a trial balloon about moving races from ESPN to SPEED. I’ve heard the argument over and over, in print and on radio that this is a bad idea because EPSN is in 100 million homes and SPEED is in “only” 78 million homes. They argue this would be a decline of 22 million potential viewers. The question not being asked how many of those 22 million ESPN watchers are actually potential viewers? […]

Joe Gibbs Racing

When Oil Pans Put On a Little Weight…

According to @tomjensen100, the oil pans confiscated from the Joe Gibbs Racing cars weighed between 20-30 lbs.  Lee Spencer posted some nice pictures of them.  A normal oil pan weighs about 4-5 lbs.  Why in […]

Busch, Kyle

Why Six Points is About Right for What Used to be a 25-Point Penalty

I was watching the movie A Clockwork Orange the other night.  There is a scene where Malcolm McDowell, having been “rehabilitated” and returned to society incapable of defending himself, is being beat up by an […]

Edwards, Carl
Engines

The Math of Fuel Mileage

I guess when you have people feeding you all the numbers you need through your earpiece, you think they’re easy to come by. That’s the only explanation I can figure out for the snarky comments by television commentators about crews not being “smart enough” to figure out how much gas to put in the car so that it doesn’t run out before the end of the race. There have been a lot of fuel mileage races the last few weeks. Pocono is traditionally also highly likely to be a fuel mileage race, so let’s clarify how easy (or hard) it is to not run out of fuel. […]

Aerodynamics

turning left, shifting right: why drivers move to the right to get air to the engine

Jack asks: “I’m curious as to why the rear cars are offsetting to the right, when offsetting to the left would let the rear driver see what is happening ahead of them and keep the radiator in cooler air, since the exhaust on these cars is on the right. I know that all those drivers and crew chiefs are smarter than I am, so I must be missing something.” […]