NASCAR Stupidity Tour Part 4, By The Mechanic

Showtime Sports breakfast with Inside NASCAR
Hey, great news! You know how it's so hard to find stuff about NASCAR? That Speed TV and ESPN and TNT and everybody else actually have a period between 2:45 a.m. and 3 a.m. that has no NASCAR show? That the 24-hour NASCAR station on Sirius Satellite Radio has some commercials, so there are periods of 2-3 minutes with zero NASCAR news?

Showtime is helping to fill that void with NASCAR Insider, which will run for 38 weeks and has Michael Waltrip and 11-foot-tall former NBA player Brad Daugherty as personalities. Why Daugherty? Because his next-favorite sport was NASCAR, and he wore number 43 on his jersey to honor his hero, Richard Petty.

He co-owns Marcos Ambrose's Sprint Cup team, and knows what he is talking about. And even if he doesn't, who is going to tell him? Waltrip, by the way, said he is "absolutely thrilled" about the show, which for him, is sort of downbeat.

Earnhardt Ganassi Racing
There wasn't much sign of the "Earnhardt" part of Earnhardt Ganassi Racing, which is pretty much Dale's widow Teresa, who wouldn't show up to take questions in front of a bunch of unwashed media if her life depended on it.

This is now a two-car team, with Roush castoff Jamie McMurray joining Juan Pablo Montoya (when did he become Pablo? Wasn't it like just overnight? Is that so we don't get him confused with all the other Juan Montoyas in NASCAR?). Anyway, they are excited about taking it to the next level, and everyone was patient even though they were eying the big Bass Pro Shops bags in the back that would be given out to media members who stayed for the whole speech.

NHRA-zMAX Dragway announcement
Huh? NHRA? Why are we at a drag strip on a NASCAR tour? Because Charlotte Motor Speedway hosts the tour for NASCAR, and they own a drag strip. O. Bruton Smith, 82, who is the top dog at Speedway Motorsports, which owns this track and Bristol and Las Vegas and Atlanta and Texas and a bunch of other things and places and people, including Sonic Automotive, the third-largest dealership network in the country, remains the most entertaining loose cannon in motorsports.

As if he needed the money, Bruton filed suit against the county for $80 million in incentives he thinks they stiffed him on, and at one point in the interview he looks right at a TV camera and starts talking about how local officials are crooks and cheaters and liars and don't clean up after they have a picnic and have questionable hygiene and heritage, and everybody who didn't know Bruton just sort of started to back up and look for the exit. The Mechanic is proud to live in a country where billionaires can say anything they want.

Anyhow, when Bruton built this new drag strip two years ago, he told the NHRA that we wanted to run cars four wide, and the NHRA said no, that wasn't safe, potential disaster, never work, ain't gonna happen, but this being Bruton, it's admirable they held out as long as they did because in March, they're going to have the NHRA Four-Wide Nationals.

It was heartily endorsed by the other leading motorsports loose cannon, NHRA Funny Car racer and political analyst John Force, who noted, "Like Obama says, we've got to have change." Bruton also owns zMAX, the engine additive that "penetrates metal," and we got some free bottles, which The Mechanic plans to try out on your car, OK? Of course, Carroll Shelby endorses it, and Shelby never does anything for the money, right?

Visit to the NASCAR technical center
Finally! Sort of like the way they make you sit through the whole time-share condo presentation to get your free dinner, members of the media hoping to sneak away early had to hang around for NASCAR's only real official part of the tour. Chairman Brian France gave his "state of the sport" talk, again revealing that all is well, and to pay no attention to the man behind the curtain. Which may have been Bruton Smith, who knows?

Then Robin Pemberton, vice president of competition, told us stuff we already knew: Sprint Cup cars would be going from the big Pep Boys-style wing back to spoilers, which we sort of guessed because they had already released specs for the spoiler and cars were already on the track testing it. And he said they would use a bigger restrictor plate at Daytona for the carburetors, going to 63/64ths of an inch, from, I think, 62/64ths of an inch, which won't make hardly any difference, especially since everybody gets the bigger plate, so there's no advantage.

Then Pemberton gave us The Quote NASCAR Will Regret all year. They had been restricting "bump drafting," which is when one car literally pushes another car around Daytona or Talladega. It's scary at Talladega in the turns, but it's insane at Daytona, which is rougher and has worn-out pavement. Even though, said Pemberton: "We will put it back in the hands of the drivers and we will say, 'Boys, have at it and have a good time.'"

Which is like saying, "Foxes, there's the hen house. Have a good time!"

NASCAR may well have to backtrack at Daytona after a front-runner or two gets spun in the corner, and the spinner says to the spin-ee: "Hey, NASCAR said it was OK."

At any rate, it should be interesting.

The only other bit of news is the announced "promotion" of John Darby, series director and top cop at the racetrack every weekend, to an inside position with R&D. The timing is weird, especially since NASCAR has no replacement ready. Lots of people think there is more to the story, but it's time to go home, and that's what The Mechanic is doing.

Later, dudes. I'm taking my zMAX and Extenze and hitting the road. -- The Mechanic, Inside Line Contributor

E-mail me at themechanic@edmunds.com.