The Car of Tomorrow needs to be impro…
The Car of Tomorrow needs to be improved before it’s too late
Car of Tomrorow
CNN.com
The Car of Tomorrow has hurt Tony Stewart, Jeff Gordon and other normally top-caliber drivers.
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Jeff Gordon was mediocre Sunday at the Auto Club Speedway in California, finishing 15th and remaining winless through 25 races of the Sprint Cup season. Teammate Jimmie Johnson was untouchable, leading virtually from green to checkered flag for his third win of the season.
They are both Cup multi-champion drivers with access to all the wonders that Hendrick Motorsports has to offer, including information on how their cars are prepared. Only a year ago they were the powers-that-be in Cup. Gordon was second in the championship and was the only realistic challenger to Johnson in the Chase.
What has changed? They have the same crew chiefs and it would be foolish to think Gordon’s ability has slipped or that his desire has waned.
I think the secret to that difficult-to-find competitiveness is in the unloved former Car of Tomorrow, which went from part- to full-time use this season. It’s a strange car, one unlike anything anybody in NASCAR has ever worked upon or driven.
It’s the same for everybody, but only a few drivers and crew chiefs have found an edge. It’s at least part of the reason Kyle Busch has gone from one win at Hendrick in 2007 to eight with Gibbs, and why Carl Edwards has jumped from three wins to six. With 11 races remaining, both drivers are good bets to add to those totals.
Gordon’s No. 24 seems stuck, unable to make the breakthrough necessary to reach Victory Circle. He could be headed for his first winless season since his rookie year of 2006. An even more telling sign of his decline is 14 finishes out of the top-10. Gordon had only six in 36 races last year.
“It’s been frustrating,” team owner Rick Hendrick said of Gordon’s season Sunday at California. “They are working awful hard. They are testing. The car is just… it’s a fine edge. What works for one driver doesn’t work for another driver. You have to tune the car to the driver. We have some really good tracks for the 24 [Gordon] coming up, but we’ve definitely got to get better on the mile and a halves.
“We’ve had unbelievable things happen, breaking suspension pieces, but we just haven’t been as good, nowhere near as good as he was last year, and we’ve just struggled. We are going to keep going, keep working and nobody is giving up on that team, or any of our teams. We work hard together and we’ll keep testing. It’s almost like the light comes on when you find a package that’s good for that driver and that’s what we’ve got to figure out [for Gordon].”
Gordon and crew chief Steve Letarte kept throwing changes at Gordon’s Chevrolet at California and nothing worked. He was third at Fontana in February, when the weather was much cooler and the track conditions completely different.
“I was hoping to have a little bit better run, but we got everything out of it we could,” Gordon said. “We were pretty much a 15th-place car and that’s where we ended up.”
Gordon was sixth in the points three races ago, but has slipped to 10th going into the regular season finale Saturday at Richmond. He’s 102 points in front of 13th-placed David Ragan. It’s not likely, but Gordon could miss the Chase. Could have anyone imagined that in February?
The stark contrast between teammates this season also includes Cup champions Tony Stewart and Matt Kenseth.
Stewart has at least two wins in each of his previous nine Cup seasons. He doesn’t have any in 2008, compared to eight by Gibbs’ teammate Busch. Stewart has had some misfortunes and near misses, but he hasn’t been a steady contender like summers past.
Sunday, Stewart faded badly in the final 100 laps, to 22nd and the final car on the lead lap. Crew chief Greg Zipadelli tried everything in trying to solve a loose condition and couldn’t.
“It was a tough night,” Stewart said. “We just couldn’t get the car to tighten up. About halfway through the race the balance was getting better, but it just went away over the last two runs and that was it.”
Kenseth is winless for the first time since the 2001 season. Roush Fenway teammate Edwards has six. Kenseth, like Stewart, running just well enough to make the Chase. He’s ninth, one position behind Stewart.
Busch, Edwards and Johnson have combined to win 70.8 percent, 17 of 25, of the races. It’s atypical, a strange season created by a strange car.
Gibbs’ Denny Hamlin, who has a win this season and, with back-to-back third places, seems to be figuring out what the car needs, says the dominance is based upon the Big Three finding that sweet spot.
“It’s definitely the race car,” Hamlin said. “This race car puts you in such a tight box of what you can work on. You basically run the same setup everywhere you go. So, when a guy gets an advantage like the 99 [Edwards)]has and the 18 [Busch] and now the 48 [Johnson] has definitely caught up, it jut makes it that more magnified when we come to a big racetrack like that [California] as to how good their car is.”
The CoT was built for greater safety, which it has delivered, but also for closer racing and to limit the cubic dollars a team can throw at it to gain an edge and bring more drivers and teams to greater competitiveness. It’s been a failure in the second and third goals.
The best teams and drivers are always going to win the majority of races, but the CoT has created more have nots than haves. Does NASCAR really want a series dominated by two or three drivers? What’s the point of the Chase in that scenario?
“There’s nothing comfortable about driving this car,” Johnson said. “This thing is never going to do a complete lap and have everything work out right for you. You’re going to have to compromise somewhere. We’re doing a good job of making the compromises and finding the speed in the right areas.
“This car is not comfortable and I don’t think it ever will be — the lack of downforce, the higher CG [center of gravity] and all of the things, which is just like NASCAR wanted it. They wanted it to be in the driver’s hands and they made it hard to drive, that’s for sure.”
Hendrick says the gap between teammates has made teams work harder than they should have to work.
“You can look at the other teams, the 99 and the 18, the other cars on those teams are not as dominant as those two cars are,” Hendrick said. “And so it’s just this car, I’ve never seen since I’ve been in racing. It is so temperamental and you just have to figure out crew chief and driver what they like and we worked harder this year. I can’t remember testing any more, more meetings, throwing more things at it to try to get better.
“This thing has made a lot of people pull their hair out and we’ve been on the top of the list because it’s hard. I mean, this guy [Johnson] left his vacation and twice came back [to test] 18 or 19 times at tracks that were not NASCAR Cup sanction tracks. It was supposed to have been easier than this.”
The CoT was a noble undertaking, but NASCAR needs to make changes for the good of the sport.
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