August 30th, 2010 
Journo Wow, what a race! Drama. Damage. And a drag race!
What we saw Sunday in Montreal is why we all enjoy watching racing. There was no anointed winner, leading the most laps led to disaster, and the best funded team didn’t win. There was passion (and one middle finger), and boy was there carnage.
What really got me excited though was the large and passionate crowd. Our friends to the north love NASCAR and I’m starting to think they deserve more than just one Nationwide race a year.
NASCAR entered the Canadian market in 2004 and has since expanded with the acquisition of the former CASCAR series (now the NASCAR Canadian Tire Series), and the staging of that one yearly event at Circuit Gilles Villenueve in Montreal.
Unlike their four year foray into Mexico, NASCAR’s Canadian event has remained quite popular. And it’s no wonder given the occasionally strange, and always entertaining events Circuit Gilles Villenueve produces.
Some last week were calling for NASCAR to bring a Cup Series event to the track. And I say why not? Given the Nationwide races we’ve seen at the track I’d love to see what kind of hijinks the Cup cars could get into on the 2.71 mile road course. But honestly I’d be fine with a Cup race anywhere in the country. I thinks the fans have earned it – I think they deserve it.
Have you heard about the proposed Canadian Motor Speedway in Fort Erie, Ontario (near Buffalo, N.Y.)? It’s nothing more than an idea right now, but the developers are working with Jeff Gordon and they’re in talks with racetrack architect Paxton Waters to build the one mile tri-oval. They’re still a ways from anything being built, but the potential is interesting.
In the meantime we have a perfectly good (or as I should say, exceptional) facility with a group of people who can’t get enough stock car racing. I’m always an advocate for bringing the sport to people who want to see it, so why isn’t NASCAR doing more?
As we just wrapped up the scheduling for 2011 and saw what could have been pretty big changes turn into some cosmetic moves, we got a front row view of the politics involved.
NASCAR is privately owned by the France family. The France family is the majority shareholder (with 70% of the voting stock) in the publicly traded International Speedway Corporation. And then we have Bruton Smith and his publicly traded Speedway Motorsports Inc. Those two control all but three of the tracks that have NASCAR Cup Series dates and neither is giving up one of their very valuable dates anytime soon. Ask Jerry Carroll how hard it is to get a Cup date.
Still, Canada is a market NASCAR should be more involved in. We’ll see in the future if NASCAR thinks so. I just hope Canadian NASCAR fans get the respect they deserve.
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Awesome race!!
Would have been a sweeter deal had they used the new Busch cars.
Canada, yes. I have no problem with that. But you can keep the road courses.
I couldn’t agree more. Fantastic race. Fantastic city, Fantastic track. FANTASTIC CROWD.
Dear France Family, they’re not packing in the crowds at Martinsville, Dover, and Indy and many others.
Go where the fans are. You could argue that was the most passionate fan response the sport has seen in recent memory.
Road course racing is great in the COT and far more entertaining than 500 miles at California or Pocono, 400 miles at Chicago. Heck, even Bristol isn’t as compelling as Montreal.
Ditto awesome race!!! I’d have no problem with a Cup date there. It was difficult to start when weeding out the inexperience with all the cautions, but once the race settled in, great stuff!! Can’t wait to see the new NNS cars on it next year. And we couldn’t stop commenting on the enthused crowd. I’ve been there once & it was one of my most memorable racing trips.
Great race!!
Montreal would be the perfect place for a road course race in the Chase. Living in Upstate NY I am really looking forward to the Canadian Motor Speedway. That track will got a lot of fans from both sides of the boarder. Close Pocono, and move a race there or Montreal.
I do agree with Canada getting a race. Great to see a different driver win a race. You rooted for any of the top 3 to win. Great race. A little on the long side for only 74 laps but was well worth it. The only thing I saw that could use improvement was “Victory Lane” No fireworks, Gatorade splash or nothing real celebratory. Other than that Great action.
Not to reveal anything new, but a seemingly well-kept secret or two…the TV audience for NASCAR in Canada (per capita, since the US has 10x our 33-million population) is larger than in the U-S, and has been for many years. 6-million people live within 100-miles of Toronto and a very high percentage of them are involved in the auto sector. We race ‘em where we build ‘em too. What may be a bit different (and perhaps more Canadian) is that we tend to like racing as a sport (and in all its forms) and cheer all drivers, as opposed to picking and choosing drivers to worship or hate. But you likely won’t find a better fan (or better party or beer), thank north of the 49th.
Who is the anointed winner in Cup and who does the anointing? Not the media since they’ve named three different champions already (remember when it was a given that 48, then 11, then 29 had it locked up?). There have been 11 different winners in 24 races this year and none of them named Earnhardt. The expert media rarely picks the winner week to week. Cuban was right.
Terrific race, better than 90% of the cookie cutters. As long as Waltrip wasn’t there I didn’t care who the announcers were.
Now that Boris has won a race I think it’s time to cut that hair.
That was the best NASCAR race I’ve seen all year, period. Those cars have no business making those turns, and that start is crazy! What a great course! I’m still jazzed. Bring the Cup guys up there!!!
That was great race. Normally I would be pulling for Robby Gordon, but I was actually glad we he ran short on fuel and had to park it. Had RG been around the last 2 laps, I think it would have been a crashfest instead of the real race shootout we witnessed between the 09, 33 and 32. IMO RG would have taken everyone out to win that race.
Now my beef. Why in the world is ESPN showing RG’s parked car and then RG walking from his car when the intense racing is happening “on track”??? I was screaming on the TV.
This TV production style (trying to capture emotion on the pit box, etc. while racing is going on) seems to be happening way too often (not just ESPN).
Towards the end, that race had much of the character of an AMA road race (motorcycle). It’s no coincidence that fans loved the action no matter who won it, since great racing is great racing no matter who’s doing it! NASCAR should never, ever underestimate the pulling power of great racing.
I was sad to see Marcos have trouble, but very happy for the top 3. I have looked around on various Nascar and general racing forums and everywhere people are saying Nascar needs more road racing. I tend to agree. The things that make open wheel road racing sometimes a bit dull are eliminated in stock cars. It’s ok to touch wheels and slide a bit, and the tension seems so much tighter as a spectator. I know close racing is very tight and difficult on ovals, but you can almost feel it in the tv screen on a road course, especially with big, heavy overpowered and poor handling cars like that.