NASCAR drivers' successful formation of a drivers' council could be seen as meaning that the sanctioning body "is turning up its hearing aids," which is "no small thing," according to Ryan McGee of ESPN.com. McGee: "NASCAR officials aren't just listening. They are listening. As in taking meetings, writing stuff down, and leaving those discussions with the pads of paper still under their arms and not immediately thrown into the recycling bin as soon as their guests have left the room." NASCAR's "road map back to prosperity needs to be drawn up not by the autocrat himself, but with the input of the people." McGee: "That's exactly what's happening. Don't take it from me. Take it from the people who make their living in the garage." McGee cited one NASCAR team exec as calling the Race Team Alliance's formation tantamount to a "sea change." The "highest-profile proof of this new age of attentiveness" came last week, when it was announced that the Sprint Cup Series "will run a new pack of tech specs to be tried out real-time at the Kentucky Speedway on July 11." The Kentucky experiment "was spurred by a two-hour discussion that NASCAR officials held with a handful of drivers" at Dover Int'l Speedway just three weekends ago. A NASCAR team exec said of the RTA, which was formed nearly a year ago, "It's streamlined the discussions and created joint points of concerns that need to be addressed. Instead of sorting through a list of what everyone said at a bunch of different informal one-on-one meetings, there are more people at the table for fewer meetings, and we all leave those meetings with a genuine plan of attack." Another team exec added, "The dialogue is more open than it's ever been. And that's a great thing" (ESPN.com, 6/19).
