NASCAR sputters into finale
HOMESTEAD, Fla. – NASCAR’s season of doom and gloom sputters toward the checkered flag with a stout championship field but the inability to distance itself from everything that’s gone wrong in this trying year.
Martin Truex Jr.’s team is closing after the race because his primary sponsor is leaving the sport. Kevin Harvick’s team was caught cheating then justified using an illegal spoiler because other teams were doing it first.
Fans hope the four championshipcontending cars are legal but won’t know for sure until the cars have been
inspected, long after the celebration is over, because the culture of cheating in NASCAR hasn’t gone away.
Television ratings hit a low in 26 events this year, and the cumbersome rulebook, a vulnerable inspection process and NASCAR’s officiating has received far too much attention of late.
NASCAR may or may not be for sale, the France family doesn’t often speak publicly and their intentions remain private. But the August drunk-driving arrest of Brian France forced a change at chairman and a definitive shift in NASCAR leadership. It was Ben Kennedy, the 26-year-old great grandson of NASCAR’s family, who represented the series during the Truck Series celebration.
Next up is the Cup title race Sunday at Homestead-Miami Speedway that pits reigning series champion Truex against Harvick, Kyle Busch and Joey Logano in a winner-take-all finale. It’s the strongest final four since NASCAR adopted this format in 2014 – the four drivers combined to win 22 of 35 races this season – but the on-track action has been overshadowed time and again by off-track problems.
“I think the racing has been unbelievable this season,” Truex said. “A lot of action, a lot of big moments on the racetrack. I don’t really worry too much about the stuff that happened away from it. I think the sport is in a good place and heading in a good direction.”
It’s a sound endorsement from a journeyman driver who hit the jackpot when paired with single-car Furniture Row Racing, a mid-level team based in Denver that defied all odds and won last year’s Cup title. But that title wasn’t enough to keep the team’s main sponsor from leaving and Furniture Row will close after Sunday’s race rather than try to compete on the cheap.
Truex and crew chief Cole Pearn will join Joe Gibbs Racing next season, and Sunday is a final opportunity for one last celebration with the Furniture Row team.
“You can imagine how sick you feel when you see it coming to a close,” said FRR President Joe Garone, who like Truex distanced the team’s closing as an indictment of the overall health of the sport.