Dale Earnhardt Jr. Urges NASCAR to “Get Rid of Stage Cautions Entirely”
NASCAR Hall of Famer Dale Earnhardt Jr. has given his verdict on the need to change the stage brake system in the sport.
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Dale Earnhardt Jr. (Via IMAGO)
The stage cautions or stage breaks was introduced to NASCAR with the primary goal of making racing more entertaining and inspire drivers to be pro-active throughout the event. It also helped teams to be more strategy oriented, regarding pit-stops. But not everyone is fan of the artificial cautions and Hall of Famer Dale Earnhardt Jr. got a perfect solution to it.
In the latest episode of his podcast, Dale Jr. Download, the JR Motorsports co-owner discussed the comments made by Kyle Busch and Denny Hamlin on the topic. Dale Earnhardt Jr. believes the time has come to end the stage breaks but wants to keep the playoff points system alive. So, the drivers will be rewarded for being ahead in the certain lap in the race.
Get rid of stage cautions entirely. No stage break caution, that goes away. You still pay points out at certain moments in the race, as we do today. I’m fine with that. I like people accumulating points during the race.
Dale Earnhardt Jr. said via Dale Jr. Download.
But this point system has it’s won demerit, which is the fact that the drivers that wins race might not always will be the highest point earner. This is a conflicting situation considering the drivers shouldn’t earn points for getting a good finish at the end owing to luck compared drivers who was consistent the whole race or vice versa.
It does create a conversation that I think we need to have around somebody who finished 14th getting fifth-place points or the fifth-best points, or the guy even winning the race not having the most points as the guy in second or third because of what happened throughout the race. I don’t know if I love all that, but hey, that’s another conversation.
Dale Earnhardt Jr. added.
Dale Earnhardt Jr. explained how NASCAR has changed over the years
Ahead of the All-Star race week, Dale Jr. made some bold comments regarding the current state of NASCAR. Junior revealed how the financial investment over fielding teams in NASCAR has skyrocketed. It’s not easy to field even open cars as it used to be in the past and he kind of missed the opportunity to buy a charter cheap.
Junior revealed that at the moment it cost $50 million to buy a Cup charter if he wasn’t to make JRM’s dream move to the elite division. He expects the cost to rise significantly as he predicted an increase to over $200 million. The series in the last ten years have almost become a exclusive millionaire owners club.
Today, to just get out there and compete, you need that $50 million charter, and that charter is going to be $100 million and $150 million and $200 million — it’s going to go to the moon over the next several years. It was a good time to buy it 10 years ago. I regret that I didn’t. But it’s become this place where only people with that kind of money can play.
Dale Earnhardt Jr. said.
The comment from the veteran shows he really regret missing out on the opportunity to buy a Cup charter when it was cheap, for JRM. It would be interesting to see how everything is going to playout for Junior and the charter business.
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