Is This The Future Of NASCAR Content?

This week, I’m giving you a different style of content. No bias, no spin, no narrative – just straight facts from the track to your screen. Before every race I complete the following list of necessary information:

Total Laps: 400
Total Miles: 300
Top speed: 155 mph
Average lap time: 23 seconds
Fuel window: 125 Laps
Tire window: Unknown (weather dependent)
Pace car: 25 Camry XSE
Stages: 70, 160, 170
Weather: Drizzle

Next, I watch practice and qualifying, and take notes about standings and the upcoming race.

Night racing sees cooler track surfaces, which produces less grip
Pit road is tight and it’s been common to see incidents
Qualifying Top 5 Group A: Lagano, Gibbs, Larson, Chastain, Bowman
Qualifying Top 5 Group B: Elliot, Wallace, Cindric, Gilliland, Truex
Pole: Kyle Larson, HMS
Top 5: Larson, Elliot, Chastain, Bowman, Wallace
This week there were plenty of paint schemes I liked, but only a few that I absolutely loved. Even so, my top three were a tough choice

In the next section of each article, I take my race notes and turn them into a narrative-style telling of information. I’ll often add flares of drama or contention to make it more story-like. In today’s article though, here are my raw notes – drama free.

Asphalt around top had more grip in the rain than the bottom of the track
Pit Speed 45 mph
Night race, bright paint stood out under the lights
Started on wet tires
Drivers had to relearn grooves on the wet surface
Lead flip flopped between Larson and Chase a few times in the first 10 laps
Wallace moved up the pack pretty well, 2nd by lap 22, and similarly Reddick up 5 spots in same time frame
Fastest lap dry was 149 mph, but wet was 113 mph
NASCAR threw a competition caution on lap 30 and mandated all teams switch from rain tires to slicks. We didn’t go green again until lap 49
Wallace and Larson stayed side-by-side battling for the lead until Kyle Larson completely overtook on lap 53
Lap 64 Berry got into Suarez, and Suarez drifted almost the entire corner before finally losing it. Thankfully he didn’t hit the wall.
NASCAR kept this caution out through stage-end and made the stage caution non-competitive due to slick conditions on pit road. This gave Stage 1 victory to Larson
Race restarted on Lap 80
While this was a Toyota sponsored race, at lap 105 the top 12 was 5 fords, 4 chevys, and 3 Toyotas
Wallace showed the first rotor glow on lap 106 as he was running 5th – turns out his rotor fans were not on
Stenhouse got loose into hocevar on lap 113, but there wasn’t a spin or caution
Green flag cautions started on lap 123. Most cars got 4 tires.
Hocevar got into Burton on lap 136, no spin or caution
The top 8 leaders didn’t pit together
4 fords in the top 10 on lap 150. This is the best performance we’ve seen from Ford this year
Larson pit on lap 152. This gave Wallace the lead for one lap, and he came in on 153 with bowman. Then Truex had the lead.
With 75 to go Buescher was in 5th, Byron was an 11th, and Reddick was in 13th
Caution came out on lap 170 for Kyle Bush hitting the wall.
About half the field pit on this caution, Truex stayed in first
Reddick gained 3 spots on pit road
Ty Gibbs, Preece, and Haley got pit penalties and had to restart at the rear
Cindric got into Blaney on the restart. No spins
Lap 181 had a top 5 of Truex, Berry, Lagano, Larson, Bell
All 3 of my picks were in the top 10 by lap 200
With the track almost completely dry, lap 205 saw the fastest speed up to 142 mph
We continued to stage end without incident. Truex took the victory.
The leaders all pit over the stage caution
Truex took a good jump on the restart leaving Larson in 2nd
Lagano and Hamlin had an aggressive battle for p3. They dueled for 8 laps before the 22 overtook
Lap 252 there were 5 Toyotas in the top 10, 3 fords, 2 chevys
Lap 264 Hamlin and Bell started battling for 4th. Bell passed him 3 laps later
Bell started to battle Lagano for 3rd on 286 as cars started to pit under green
Leaders all pit on 298 along with half the field
Bell didn’t pit, instead grabbing first. EVERYONE ELSE pit, leaving Bell as the only one on the lead lap until he pit on 294. This gave Truex the lead.
Meanwhile Bell got bit with a pit penalty which put him a lap down
By lap 308 Bell was on the lead lap again and in 18th
With 75 to go, Byron was 6th, Buescher was 8th, Reddick was in 11th struggling with tight shifts
Reddick started the green flag pits with 67 to go
Byron pit the next lap, and all the leaders came in the following lap, except Hamlin
Larson beat Truex out of the pits but couldn’t hold him off
Bell also stayed out and moved into p2
Hamlin pit with 59 to go giving Bell 1st with Truex and Larson quickly catching up on fresh tires
Bell pit with 54 to go giving Truex the lead
Would be Truex’s 7th short track win
With 10 to go, Hamlin started chomping at the bit to pass Lagano for p2 as Truex was hitting lapped traffic in first
With 6 to go Lagano moved into position to take the lead from Truex, but kept losing time out of turn 2
With 5 to go, top 5 are Truex, Lagano, Hamlin, Larson, Wallace
With 2 to go, BEFORE THE WHITE FLAG CAME OUT, Wallace got into Larson and spun him for a caution
The front 4, plus ⅓ of the field pit under caution, Hamlin beat lagano and Truex out of the pits
Wallace struggled in the pits and lost 11 positions
Hamlin and Truex battled with 2 to go, Hamlin overtook
Lagano overtook Truex on the last lap
As the last lap progressed, Truex hit Larson. Larson didn’t appreciate that and ran Truex up the track for a mild wall scrape as they crossed the finish line with Larson in 3rd. In response, after they crossed the line, Truex hit into Larson again, so Larson drove Truex up into the wall much harder.
Martin drove up to his teammate Hamlin, and rear ended him several times

This is a much more bare bones approach to covering NASCAR races. I’d be interested to know your thoughts on this approach versus the narrative-style recap articles I’ve been doing this year. If you like this style better, please let me know! As I continue writing multiple times each week to cover this NASCAR season, I’d love to get to know some of my readers! Feel free to reach out to me via X (Twitter), or on Instagram! Make sure to visit my profile to catch the articles you’ve missed! To see my latest photography work, go to StingerAuto.com or look me up on Facebook! Last but not least, I wanted to let you know that I’ve become an affiliate with Goodyear. Click HERE to get the best deals on tires!