Bristol Herald Courier from Bristol, Tennessee • 20

B4 THURSDAY APRIL 26 2012 MOTORSPORTS i BRISTOL HERALD COURIER TriCitiescom Smiths decision a compromise BMS owner hopes to please drivers and fans with changes The Bristol Motor Speedway soap opera continuesto evolve or weeks many diehard BMS fans have pleaded with track owner Bruton Smith to wield his magic wand and recreate the rowdy days at his half mile short track Meanwhile drivers and lap JJL dog media types have favored the status quo They label the BMS Allen critics as drunken Greuorv s'mpietons who Commentary simply watch races for the wrecks On Wednesday morning Smith finally unveiled his strategy to breathe life back into the 160000 seat marvel The announcement to elimi nate the progressive banking in the comers was far from earth shattering But it should at least tighten up the competition and create more action an interesting time for BMS and NASCAR as a whole Due to a variety of factors including the uniform design of the cars and the durability of tires most of the races this season have been devoid of drama Entering last race at Kansas the number of cautions were down by 35 percent The March 18 event at BMS featured the fewest number of cautions (five) since 1996 The California race had the lowest number of cautions (one) in track history while Martinsville had the least number of cautions since 1996 7 SUBMITTED ILLUSTRATION Artist rendering showing the difference in the banking from this past race in March to the upcoming August race at Bristol Motor Speedway K'viz 4 iC'' il 'st A Jr i a Jls jp xj'j a aND WvSs9HBhiKIV rs'AvN''" r' i a 1 A There has also been a major decrease in the number of passes and disputes among drivers no surprise that television ratings and attendance have declined for almost every race Clearly the current malaise in NASCAR extends far beyond Bristol Motor Speedway Even the most avid fan had to be a little bored by the recent high speed parades at Texas and Kansas And yet the usual homers scolded fans for daring to suggest those races were bland those same folks who rip or mula One and IndyCar races for being too technical and brainy Even famed impresario PT Barnum would be challenged to promote the cunent brand of cautious racing we see in NASCAR The Bristol Motor Speedway show once offered a much need ed respite from the normalcy of mile and a half tracks Yes there were wrecks at Bristol but the success story went far deeper There were close quarters rac ing hold your breath passes and old fashioned bumping why the little track in the moun tains morphed into a 160000 seat monster that attracted 55 straight sellouts With attendance falling for each race Bruton Smith was forced to make some sort of bold move at Bristol When half your seats are empty you have no choice but to act Shortly after Smith made his announcement Wednesday inorning the social media world 1 came alive with both praise and complaints for the motorsports maverick Doing away with the progres sive banking was essentially a compromise since drivers will still have two grooves to race on At some point up to the well paid stars to force the ac tion And enough with the arrogant mocking of fans who endure high ticket prices and grossly inflated motel rates to enjoy their favorite sport Smce the days of Ben Hur and backwater dirt tracks contact has been an es sential part of racing admit it wrecks are fun And when you shell out $100 for a ticket $5 for a hamburger and $200 for a hotel room a fan Reserves to have fun And they definitely deserve to have a voice If drivers had their way all tracks would be multi groove imitations of Michigan There would be no bumping no bang ing and no memorable mo ments We would basically have good looking robots who peddle a product and a smile for star struck fans Like him or not give Bruton Smith credit for listening to his customers and responding agreg2rybristolnewscom (276) 645 2544 BMS rom Page Bl Wednesday that harkened back to five years ago On hand for the latest announce ment was 12 time Bristol cham pion Darrell Waltrip who took a jackhammer to the track in 2007 to dislodge the ceremonial first chunk of concrete And similar to an out of the blue comment in summer 2007 prior to the first NASCAR races on the new surface about the possibility of add ing 8000 more seats to BMS Smith again made a surprising aside dur ing announcement with a musing about increasing ca pacity at the track by 7000 Back in 2007 BMS leaders ini yssSiM I ie MwCKil rf EwHH wl '41 xfeX 'f Ia 4 tially claimed the project cause a significant change to the character of the track saying fans DAVID CRIGGERBRISTOL HERALD COURIER Modifications to Bristol Motor Speedway have begun with crews grinding down the progressive banking at the tops of the turns notice much of a differ ence other than a cleaner whiter racing surface But by the time the work was complete the comments shifted in tone Shortly before the first Cup race at the resurfaced track in August 2007 then BMS president Jeff Byrd who died in 2010 told a Bristol Herald Courier reporter that the changes would be noticeable to both spec tators and drivers fans as well as some of the Nextel Cup guys will be shocked when they come Byrd said in 2007 so radically Along with the addition of the progressive banking in 2007 the track was widened from 40 to 43 feet as workers labored in 12 hour shifts 24 hours a day to pour the new concrete in a job that was started the day after the spring race and completed in early July of that year The 2007 project the first major undertaking at BMS since the track was changed from asphalt to con crete in 1992 was also in the plan ning stages for about a year before any work began in stark contrast to the new job which was proposed only after half empty bleachers moved Smith to action this spring Caldwell said the compressed timeframe this time around lim ited the possibilities for the new worst thing possibly that could happen was you do some thing and it impact the race in August not being able to pull that off so a project similar in scope to 2007 was never going to be an op he said But while specifics put into motion until recent weeks and are still up in the air regarding certain technical aspects Speed way Motorsports Inc Chief operat ing officer Marcus Smith empha sized that it was more than just one race that influenced the decision to make a change an overnight deci he said is something been considering since re paving the track in 2007 While the chatter has been more this year the culmination of the last few Many characteristics of the post 2007 track did in fact emerge al most immediately after the resur facing was complete After a July 23 2007 test bn the new surface driver Ken Schrader said he noticed the availability of a' new groove "It drives like the old Bristol but the new transitional banking gives us some more Schrader said' The extra space played a major factor in the August 2007 Busch Series race as Kasey Kahne tri umphed in the ood City 250 with a high pass of Ryan Newman with eight laps remaining "You used to have to knock some one out of the way to pass some Johnny Benson said after winning the August 2007 trucks race you can race the top and the you have to use your bumper to make your way to the added Carl Edwards follow ing his victory in the August 2007 Cup race which see its first caution until lap 125 Speakers Wednesday stated that their goal with the new project is to find a happy medium between the and Bristol "Although we do have the blue prints of the pre 2007 track con figuration I certainly want to come in heri with bulldozers be cause a lot of the drivers and a lot of the fans said touch it touch Bruton Smith said please everyone but we had more touch its leave it than we did otherwise What doing now is modifying what we have I really believe doing the right Caldwell said he hopes the new configuration yields 'The best of both worlds" going to tighten these guys up bring them back Caldwell said not going to be able to get away from each other very quickly It will breed ex A nhubbardbristolnewscom twitter: HubbardBHCSprt (276) 645 2543 Sacco rom Page Bl other Then again kind of not since the track will still have two grooves and there still will be side by side racing kind of a compromiseSmith and his venerable track have touted since the Bringing Bristol back to its pre 2007 configuration for the August race would have been near impossible if the work was just starting now especially with Goodyear having to test tires on the new surface in June want to create a train wreck Smith said modifying what we day after the ood City 500 in March that they were go ing to listen to the fans and give them what they wanted That he kind of did too Though which set of fans he listened to is open to debate A modification that needed if you were part of that 60 percent (Occupy Bristol?) It all comes down to Smith and his kneejerk reaction to the empty seats that he stared down on from his OK to join the ranks of the underwhelmed when you heard what plan was for Bristol Motor Speedway Yeah going to grind down the top of the turns and get rid of the progres sive banking But to think going to bring back the much longed for old days is pure folly It It swanky suite during the March race You see empty seats he sees less money and the track owner admit ted it was then and there that he decided was going to change The next day he came out and said was going to happen Smith should have let it stew for a bit and left the i track as it was for the August know what this IRWIN Tools Night Race new car would do on that more a spectacle than a race old surface" said BMS gen these days which is guar eral manager Jerry Caldwell' anteed to put 155000 in his And you know what 160000 seat palace Heck right 1 as the news conference went Give them credit there on Smith said ticket sales But as they touted at every are on the upswing for that turn how they planned to event There are going to be listen to the fans butts the bleachers for guesstimation of the fan that race every year split made it hard to stifle The true test comes in anylaughter March 2013 when they race was about 40 he under the sun and said 40 percent and see what the fan reac tor change and 6Q percent tion is then touch "We do think win Do what now? these race fans over to our OK what happened to the side on Smith said uproar? or weeks every going to love it" body expected that it was Silly us we thought when an outcry from the (lack of) you listened to fans there ticker buyers that brought were just a few you had to on this change To hear convince Sixty percent is Smith drop those numbers a heck of a lot more than a is tough to wrap your head few around tough to imag So yeah Smith kind of ine that even if the numbers listened to the fans but by were flip flopped it would his numbers he listen be enough to warrant a to the right ones change jsaccobristolnewscom Twitter: Time is also a factor here SaccoBHCSports (276) 645 2572 Ji ti fert A w1.