Things They Are A Changin'

Originally posted on January 24, 2007 on Foxsports.com

With the start of the 2007 season around the corner, Nascar is busy amending rules and there are changes fans will see throughout the season.

First, Nascar is limiting the past Champion's provisional.  Prior to this year, the most recent past Champion in any given race was guaranteed a starting position.  Throughout the year, Bill Elliott and Terry Labonte used this provisional to start in several races, even though they were not fast enough to qualify for the race.  In 2007, past Champions will be limited to six uses of the provisional.  Once they have used it six times, they will need to either qualify on speed or qualify on owner's points.  This rule appears to be directed at Dale Jarrett, who has no owner points to fall back on and will be racing a  Toyota Camry for Michael Waltrip Racing. 

Race winners will receive an additional 5 points.  This is in addition to the five points Nascar gave them a few years ago.  Thus, winners get 185 points while second place earns 170 points (excluding points for leading laps and most laps led).

The format to the All-Star Challenge has been modified to include 4 segments and the Pit Crew Challenge winner will get pit selection preference.  If I were in charge, I'd add that the driver must attend the Pit Crew Challenge or the team earns no points.  I don't understand why half the field didn't show up to work with their pit crews.

Races will be televised on ABC, ESPN, TNT and Fox, while Speed will still have some qualifying and the truck races.   Fans will have to spend at least five to ten minutes before each race determining what channel the race is on this week.  Then, after the race, odds are good that you will have to change channels to something else to watch the post race coverage.  Add in the time spent in commercial, is it really any mystery why viewership is down?

One change that was not announced was whether the Nextel series would change names in the near future.  Since the merger between Nextel and Sprint, speculation has been that the question is one of when, not if, the series will change names.