Posts by Melissa Peterson

shadowtinker29 said:Yeah, I'm positive. Honestly, I think it even edges out the Coca-Cola 600 and both of those races in Texas.

As far as prestige goes—I mean, winning at the Brickyard was definitely second only to Daytona for a while—but that really shifted about ten years ago. Back when that race first kicked off, there wasn't much of anything else out in the Midwest, so building a massive complex wasn't such a huge hurdle. Nowadays, you’ve got tracks like Kansas, Kentucky, and Chicagoland relatively close by. Plus—and this is a big one—remember what happened back in 2001 when NASCAR inked that new deal with NBC? Up until then, folks living in Indiana couldn't even watch the race on TV because of blackouts, so if you wanted to see it, you basically had no choice but to show up at the Brickyard in person.

To be honest, I’ve lost interest in NASCAR entirely. It’s gotten to the point where I don't even touch my racing sims anymore.

It just feels like a private family business run by the France clan. Look at how they handled young Almendinger—basically tanking his career, much like what happened to Mayfield over some minor stuff. It's ridiculous.

Then you have the grandson, driving under the influence, getting pulled over, and threatening people with their jobs just to get out of it? And somehow they still lose their positions in the end. It's a mess. Everything feels too sanitized now. I used to watch because it was fun seeing guys with actual facial hair who looked more like tractor drivers than models. Now everyone looks like they stepped off a Hollywood movie set. It’s lost its soul.

The only highlight for me was seeing Villeneuve show up at Elkhart Lake looking like a total rogue.

But honestly, I only watched that because it was at Elkhart Lake and I really miss having IndyCar on the schedule. I guess I'll just settle for the Xfinity series to take the sting out of it.

shadowtinker29 said:The Southern 500 in its true, original form—you know, the one traditionally held the day before Labor Day at the start of September—hasn't actually existed since 2004. Sure, they’ve started running a race under that name again recently, but for us die-hard fans? It just doesn't feel the same.

If my memory serves me right—and I go way back to when I first started following NASCAR in the late 80s or early 90s on that long-lost ESPN—I think there used to be some kind of trophy for whoever could sweep three out of the four biggest races. We're talking the Daytona 500, the Winston 500 over at Talladega, the Coca-Cola 600, and the "real" Southern 500.

Personally, I never really vibed with the Brickyard 400. To me, those races are almost always incredibly repetitive—boring, even. And honestly, whenever I think of Indianapolis, my mind goes straight to the Indy 500. As for what you mentioned regarding the other "major" race, there's a pretty clear reason for that. After Daytona, Indianapolis is where the real money is split.

Are you certain the winner of the Brickyard 400 actually takes home more than the prize for the Coca-Cola 600 (or whatever they call it these days)?

neonfox65 said:Indy is up this weekend—it’s basically the biggest race in the States after Daytona.



Established: 1909

Track Length: 2.5 miles

Layout: Oval

Banking: 9° turns, 0° straights

Frontstretch: 3,330 feet

Backstretch: 3,330 feet

Capacity: 250,000+ seats

Green flag drops: Sunday at 7:00 PM

Where are you getting that from? Depending on which era we’re talking about, the second biggest race after Daytona has always been the Charlotte 600—whether you call it the Coca-Cola 600 or the World 600.

In NASCAR, Indy doesn't carry much weight because it's up north in Indiana, where everyone has been obsessed with open-wheel racing for a century.

NASCAR is rooted in the South, and the Brickyard 400 was basically forced into the schedule. Tony George, the track owner, pushed hard to get it on the calendar just to secure revenue, knowing the Indy 500 viewership would dip once the IndyCar split into CART and IRL. If you look at the facts, the first Brickyard 400 was held in 1994, and the big split happened late in '95, so by 1996, the CART teams were already out. He needed to find money elsewhere. It's similar to how Bernie pushed to get his tracks on the calendar, though they weren't even up to F1 standards until the renovations were finished in 2000.

It really isn't the second most important race in NASCAR.

And what happened to the Southern 500 at Darlington? That's widely considered the true home of NASCAR.

Daytona, Charlotte, and Darlington—those are the real top three tracks.

And if you look closely, they’re all down South.