Phoenix Int'l Raceway, site of next weekend's national-series NASCAR races, yesterday announced that it "will install a 'tire pack barrier' along the interior wall of Turn 4 preceding the CampingWorld.com 500 Sprint Cup race March 15," according to Brant James of USA TODAY. The track said that the decision was made "after a review by ISC and NASCAR officials." Both ISC and SMI "have been scurrying to assess and bolster the impact-mitigating systems of their track walls" since driver Kyle Busch suffered a compound fracture of his right leg and a broken left foot during an Xfinity Series race at Daytona Int'l Speedway (USA TODAY, 3/5). NBCSPORTS.com's Dustin Long reported the track did not indicate "how much of the concrete wall will be covered" by the tire barriers. The tires will come from fellow ISC-owned track Auto Club Speedway (NBCSPORTS.com, 3/4). In Las Vegas, Ron Kantowski notes the inside walls at most NASCAR tracks "still don’t have steel and foam energy to reduce the impact of big hits." It will eventually happen, but it "won’t happen overnight, and it won’t happen at Las Vegas Motor Speedway before the cars start lapping the track at breakneck speed -- hopefully not literally -- on Friday for NASCAR Weekend" (LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL, 3/5). In Charlotte, Jim Utter writes it is "easy to say NASCAR should mandate ... SAFER barriers on every wall at every track," but there "are legitimate financial concerns." The barriers are an "enormous investment, particularly for a track that hosts only one weekend of NASCAR activity a year." But the sport’s "most valuable assets, the drivers, keep finding the unprotected walls in accidents." It is "not an easy fix, but it’s better to be safe than sorry," and NASCAR’s approach "should follow that axiom" (CHARLOTTE OBSERVER, 3/5).
TRACKSIDE SEMANTICS: REUTERS' Steve Keating reported while NASCAR calls the trend of tracks reducing capacity as "right-sizing," others see it as a "sign that something is terribly wrong with America's most popular motor sport." NASCAR COO Brent Dewar, speaking yesterday at the Leader Sports Business Summit in N.Y., maintained that downsizing "is not so much a sign of trouble but a sign of the times reflecting the race experience fans demand and the way they consume sports." He said, "What you are seeing at a lot of the tracks is widening of the seats, additional suite access, venues that allow a better fan experience. It is not just going to the race; it is more than the race. That is the story you are seeing at many of the tracks, football stadiums and baseball parks. The fan expectation today going to a sports venue is changing" (REUTERS, 3/4).
