NASCAR’s makeover
Pit changes and new faces take center stage as 2018 NASCAR season revs up
Drivers in new places. Teams with new cars. Races with new dates. Pit roads with fewer people. And a HawkEye watching over everything.
Welcome to NASCAR 2018, the latest version of the country’s top stock car racing series and the first in the post-Dale Earnhardt Jr. era.
It all starts with Sunday’s Daytona 500, always the most important and for much of its life the first Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series race of the season. After a winter with engines silent and expectations building, the eastern coast of Florida hosts an opening unlike any other in professional sports.
It’s quite odd for a sport to open its season with its biggest event, but that strategy has played well for NASCAR over the years as the mysteries associated with a new year converge with the drama of high-speed, at-risk racing on
one of the sport’s most iconic tracks.
This 500 will be the 60th as NASCAR observes the 70th anniversary of its founding. But as the season heads into the first turn, changes are afoot.
Junior departs; Juniors arrive: Dale Earnhardt Jr. has closed the door on his driving career and is detouring into television. The impact of his departure might be felt at the ticket booths.
NASCAR, however, is counting on a rush of young drivers to fill the gap. Among them: William Byron, Alex Bowman, Chase Elliott, Darrell Wallace Jr., Ryan Blaney and Erik Jones.
Byron, Bowman and Elliott drive for Hendrick Motorsports, where 42-yearold Jimmie Johnson will act as something of a den mother to the brood. Byron, perhaps the most ballyhooed young hotshot since Jeff Gordon, will drive Gordon’s former car, the No. 24. Bowman moves into Earnhardt Jr.’s No. 88.
But Hendrick isn’t the only team to make changes.
Aric Almirola and sponsor Smithfield Foods bolted from Richard Petty Motorsports to Stewart-Haas Racing, where Almirola takes over for Danica Patrick. Replacing Almirola at the Petty shop is Wallace, who will become the first fulltime African-American driver in the Cup series since Wendell Scott raced against the rest of the field and Jim Crow laws in the 1960s and 1970s.
Patrick is scheduled to race in the Daytona 500 and the Indianapolis 500 — the Danica Double — before moving into other ventures. Her departure leaves the Cup series without a full-time female driver.
Blaney moves from the Wood Brothers’ Fords to Team Penske, where he’ll become a teammate to Brad Keselowski and Joey Logano. Paul Menard replaces Blaney at Wood Brothers, whose iconic
No. 21 cars now will carry the bright colors of new sponsor Menard’s.
Kasey Kahne moves from Hendrick Motorsports to Leavine Family Racing. One man down, one Hawk-Eye up: Work on NASCAR pit roads will be a focus of more attention this season as new rules cut the number of over-the-wall pit crew people from six to five.
It might be argued that the actual reduction is from six to four because one of the five — the fueler — no longer can assist in tire placement or mechanical adjustments.
Teams have been practicing new ap- proaches to pit stops throughout the offseason. Expectations are that pit-stop times will increase between two and three seconds. Top teams changed four tires and refueled their cars in the 11second range last season.
Another change on pit road will be new pit guns for changing wheels during pit stops. In the past, teams have supplied their own guns, often custommade. Now NASCAR will assign the guns about an hour before each race.
Also new on the technical side is the Hawk-Eye camera/projection inspection station, tentatively labeled the Optical Scanning Station by NASCAR. The high-tech system will scan cars before drivers are allowed onto the track. If the shape of the car body doesn’t conform to NASCAR numbers, teams will make
changes before going through the OSS tent again.
New wheels: Chevrolet teams will race a new model — the Camaro ZL1.
Expectations are that the car will be an upgrade, particularly on faster tracks.
Ford is expected to bring the Mustang to the Cup series in 2019.
Toyota is set with the Camry, last season’s dominant model and the ride that carried Martin Truex Jr. to his first Cup championship. Scrambling the calendar: The Cup schedule has a new look, one that will be particularly evident in the playoffs.
Indianapolis Motor Speedway will host the final race of the regular season, taking that spot from Richmond Raceway, which moves into the second week- end of the playoffs.
The playoff opener moves to Las Vegas Motor Speedway. Charlotte Motor Speedway remains in the playoffs but with a new vibe.
Its fall race will be run on the track’s road course, adding a new dynamic to the playoffs. The CMS race will end the first round.
Dover International Speedway, which previously hosted the final race of the first round, now will open the second round.
The season finale — and the place where the championship will be decided — remains at Homestead-Miami Speedway, although there is significant support in NASCAR garages to make the last race an event that would move from track to track.