NASCAR's First Off Weekend Really Bites

Here I am, a college student smack in the middle of Iowa. A few weeks ago, when we were first starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel after a long, hard winter, we had Daytona, and it was glorious.

This weekend, I have spring break. No pressure, no busyness, nothing.

Nothing. Including NASCAR.

Why?

I finally have the chance to sit down and watch a good race without having to worry about anything to do. I guess NASCAR has considered this weekend a good weekend to have NO racing action. None. Neither the Camping World Truck Series, the Nationwide Series, or the Sprint Cup Series have a race this weekend.

Is there a national holiday this weekend? No. Some sort of religious holiday? Not that I know of. Some important President's birthday? Well, Andrew Jackson's birthday is on Monday, but it's been an awful long time since I've heard of a crew member lamenting over not being home to celebrate Andrew Jackson day.

Oh wait... Daylight Savings Time begins on Sunday. What a royal pain this is. I totally understand now. No wonder NASCAR doesn't dare to stage a race this weekend. We're all better off for it, I guess.

OK, enough with that. What I want to know is why none of NASCAR's three national series are racing this weekend. Not even the K&N Pro Series can be found on SPEED.

NASCAR is trying to rebuild a fan base that has shrunk in the past few seasons. Coming off a storyline-generating race at Atlanta, where we now have feud brewing between Carl Edwards and Brad Keselowski, thousands of excited new fans want to tune in this week and see what happens next, and...

Nothing. NASCAR better hope these fans have a good memory.

What about the Camping World Truck Series? They only race once a month for their first few races? What's up with that? It's awfully hard to build a following for a series that only races occasionally.

What will the newspapers have to print on Monday? Nothing.

How much money are tracks going to bring in this weekend? None.

Few, if any, of the NASCAR Home Tracks and their weekly racing programs are operational yet, so that's not an option. The midwest is still buried in snow. Wouldn't it be smarter to throw the Home Tracks a bone and have a completely free weekend in the middle of the summer where NASCAR can tell everyone via TV to go to their Home Track?

So, for the seriously, seriously addicted and crazed NASCAR fans, what is there to do this weekend? Nothing. I will be on vacation not doing the things I like to do on vacation.

But I'm freak.

The NASCAR Silicon Motor Speedway that was in my mall closed a few years ago too. Geez.

OK, now I'm just ranting.

I hope NASCAR makes a change next year so this doesn't happen again. I see absolutely no reason for there to be absolutely no racing, from anyone, this weekend.

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Other NASCAR Notes

I guess we now have a feud between Brad Keselowski and Carl Edwards. I think this might have staying power because Edwards has apparently held a grudge against Keselowski for quite a while and never acted on it.

In an interview on Sunday, Edwards admitted, "Brad never gives me any room." Plus, I've never seen him intentionally spin someone out before... much less, the rookie. There's something more to this story, something that has been brewing for quite a while, to provoke such a reaction from Carl Edwards, the mild-mannered good young man from Missouri.

NASCAR clearly wants this to keep happening too, just not to that extent. The three race probation they gave him tells me they're saying, "keep doing what you're doing, just don't go overboard like that."

NASCAR once gave Tony Steward a 6-month probation for spinning out Jeff Gordon... on pit road... when the race was over. It caused mild damage, much less turn Gordon's car into an experimental aircraft.

However, on that note, I'm still waiting for that feud we all talked about between BK and Denny Hamlin...

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-David Dubczak