2013 Motorsports Recap! Part 2, MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

Hello boys and girls!  You know what time of the year it is...it's CHRISTMAS time which means more ass-kicking race car clips for you!!  Let's begin.


The All-Star Race is a side attraction to the circus show to the NASCAR, but at least they got one good thing going for it.  Qualifying for the All-Star Race is different than regular season races and is a little game of its own.  Each driver runs three laps and has to make one pit stop.  There's no speed limit on pit road so they ZOOM right on through!  See the Beginner course trick from Daytona USA.  Bitch please, I drive through pits to shave 1.5 seconds off my laps. Though in NASCAR, you have to stop in your pit lane, so yeah, there's that too.

Messing up your pit docks you time penalties so don't screw up.  Top three qualifiers get $50K, $10K, and $5K respectively to share between themselves and their pit crews.


In previous years preceding the All-Star Race was the Pit Crew Challenge.  Basically, pit crews raced against the clock to complete their respective tasks and push their car across the finish line first.  It's a clever little ruse and pit lane choices for the All-Star Race are determined by the results of the Pit Crew Challenge.  But they didn't hold the event in 2013 for some reason so...yeah, disappointing.

These pit crew guys are athletes too, you're a fool to think otherwise.


Anyway, speaking of pit stops...here's Indy Car again.  This was at Sonoma, the 15th race of the season (out of 18).  In the thick of the championship hunt, Scott Dixon (red car) and Will Power (black car) pitted late in the race.  One of Power's crew members was walking with a tire and Dixon clipped him as he drove out.  Fortunately he wasn't hurt but Indycar penalized Dixon a pit drive-thru.

Dixon dropped from first to 15th and Power laughed his ass of as he won the race.  There was debate that the pit member deliberately stuck the tire out in order to hinder his rival.  It could've been an accident because the Indycar pit lanes differ from the lines on the pavement.  Regardless, hitting other pit crews is a black & white issue so there was no room for Dixon to debate.  There was some controversy but regardless, Dixon won the Championship and Power came in 4th overall.  Serves them right.


Back to NASCAR funny antics!  Here's Max Papis and he likes slapping people.  After the Nationwide race at Road America, he pays a little favor to his rival Billy Johnson, while walking away with that shit-eating grin.

And Max Slapis would later get his at a Craftsman Truck Race at Circuit Gilles Villeneue in Montreal.  After getting involved in a late-race wreck, a crazy lady (girlfriend of the driver of the #6 car, Mike Skeen) bitch-slapped him in the face on camera (it's at the end of the video).

Max claimed his jaw was dislocated and his ears rung after that hit.  If so, well, I smell a lawsuit!  No idea what came of it...


More fighting in NASCAR??  NO WAY!!  Rednecks gonna redneck.  BUT FIRST...Le Mans 24 (or "Luh Mah").  Drunken louts mumble and moon the camera.  THIS IS FRANCE, THE CULTURAL CENTER OF THE WORLD, WE DON'T DO SHITE LIKE THIS, RIGHT????

Back to NASCAR, basically Joey Logano is the Grim Reaper.  Well, what do I mean.  Joey gets in a fight with Denny Hamlin after a race at Bristol.  Denny would later get injured at Fontana and sit out for six weeks.

Who's next?  Tony Stewart goes redneck on Joey.  Whoops, Tony gets hurt in a dirt race in Iowa.

And Ryan Newman ALMOST came to blows with Joey but held back.  Good for Ryan!  Cause nobody f**ks with Joey.


Ya wanna see more fighting?  Let's get back to Danica Patrick.  Kyle Petty, "Danica Patrick is not a racecar driver!"  Instant classic, although I wouldn't say Kyle is that much better than Danica.  Only eight Cup Series wins in 30 years of NASCAR.  Ooooo, burned, Kyle!!!  Give Danica a couple more years and a non-shitty race team and she'll whoop your old man ass.  Okay, maybe not, but he makes a good point.  Danica has been in more than her fair share of commercials (plus one Sega racer) and doesn't have much to back it up besides a pair of tits.

But Danica is still not immune!  Here comes Jay Mohr at the NASCAR awards banquet--wait, that ass clown that read jokes off the sheet of paper at Blizzcon??  Yes indeed.  Danica and her new BF Ricky Stenhouse Jr. are not amused.  Seriously, can someone who is NOT an idiot criticize Danica for once?

Oh hey, one more clip.  This is between truck drivers Kevin Harvick (#14) and the "spoiled rich kid" Ty Dillon (#3).  Dillon clips Harvick and they both take a dive.  Harvick pulls up to Dillon's pit stop and gets a sledgehammer tossed at his car.  Last time I checked, getting hit by a tossed sledgehammer can be rather painful.  Whose the wise-ass who threw it?  It's at the end of the clip BTW.

And some more funny/cool shite:

*Brad Keselowski goes for a leisurely jog.
*Tony Stewart REDNECKS at the new cool Kyle Busch.
*Carl Edwards gets paper on his grille and gets in a fight with Greg Biffle when needing to use Greg's bumper as a toothbrush (the story sucks, I apologize).
*Brutal last-lap wreck at Talladega truck race.
*Greg Biffle's pink bumper peels off during the caution and channels his inner Mister Mayhem.

*I become a Kurt Busch fan because he drives the Wonder Bread and City Chevrolet cars in Sprint Cup and Nationwide respectively.  Mad props to him.  Kurt ballin on your chin.

*Donovan McNabb says NASCAR drivers are not athletes.  You know what, Donny boy?  You're a washed up QB like Jake Delhomme and Rex Grossman who bummed your to Superbowl losses against superior teams with superior QB's.  Definition of sport: "An activity involving physical exertion and skill in which an individual or team competes against another or others for entertainment."   Driving fast cars for 3+ hours requires a lot of stamina (and is very frustrating).  Otherwise, everybody would be doing it.  Besides, ESPN airs Poker and Spelling Bee championships and can those be called sports??  GET OUTTA HERE...

*Jimmie Johnson wins his sixth title.  Real shocker there.  Matt Kenseth almost had him but had to choke down the final stretch.  The fans on social media were raged at Jimmie's win because he's a "cheater" and he doesn't deserve it.  Unlike other NASCAR legends like Dale Earnhardt and Richard Petty, Jimmie didn't build his own team from scratch--he basically inherited Hendrick's birthright.  But regardless, kudos to him since to win that many titles when everyone hates your guts is definitely admirable.

*Also, F1.  You thought Jimmie was ruining his sport.  Well, how about Sebastian Vettel, German driver of the Red Bull team?  He won the last 9 races of the 2013 F1 season.  Yes, NINE WINS IN A ROW.  He also won the last four championships in a row.  Now F1 is talking of adding more double points races in order to level the playing field to give trailing drivers a chance to catch up to runaways like Sebastian.  Just like NASCAR instituting the Chase in response to Jimmie's domination (read my thoughts on the Chase here).  Parity, what's that?  Lol...

I pick my nose after every race.

*RIP Jason Leffler.  RIP Allan Simonsen.  RIP Paul Walker.  Fast cars are still not safe.  It makes me sad but they are to be admired for being true gearheads.  I already said my piece on deceased drivers after the Dan Wheldon crash.  Injuries and death keep happening but some would rather risk it than live a boring safe life so kudos man...kudos... ;_;

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!! :D :D :D

Classy.

PART ONE RIGHT HERE.

Talladega, Oh The Humanity!

NASCAR is boring.  BAWWWWWW...watch the last few laps of the Good Sam "DAD I FOUND A TURTLE!!!" 500.

These cars are going 190 mph.

This is RaceBuddy--Dale Jr. on the left, Jeff Gordon on the right.  You thought changing lanes on the highway was bad, well try doing that here, slick!

Then with less than a half to go, they all died. Tony Stewart went for the block but was pit maneuvered sideways into the crowd.  I can't totally blame him...he's trying to win.  Had they made it just a few more seconds they would've made it to the finish like okay.  But no, like Ahnuld Schwarzenegger in the Jingle All The Way movie, they all made a mad dash for DA TURBO MAN action figure at the finish line and the result?  OH THE HUMANITY!!!

Good Guy Junior givin Jimmie Johnson a ride to the garage.

I know there's a good saying "People only watch NASCAR for the wrecks," and I don't really believe that's the case for most people.  I enjoy the pure adrenaline of going 190+ mph and defying those wrecks.  But when I saw that 20-car pileup, I wasn't impressed or entertained, I was saddened.  Saddened because Junior's championship hopes were shot (though Jeff Gordon is back in the hunt) but also because of the carnage that ensued.  Nobody was hurt, but there was a lot of twisted metal.

TOTAL CAR-NAGE!!

To quote Sheriff John Bunnell, a stock car is a "beautiful and exciting machine."  Man, that horsepower, that transmission, the suspension & tires, I mean I like stock cars the way they are.  I mean I don't mind rubbin' cause it is racing after all, but when a car is incapacitated, it's a damn shame.  The car sort of becomes its own entity like "There goes that Diet Mountain Dew car!" and you can't help but smile (if you're a Junior fan).  It's intent was to go fast, not to wreck.  Sure, it's meant to take damage if the situation goes bad, but I'm fairly certain every team wants to see their car finish in one piece.  And it sucks that a lot of the fans assume these things are expendable tin cans or something.  Boy, I would kill to own my own stock car.  If you owned one, would you want to wreck it.  HELL NO.

Daytona USA 2 has possibly the most violent damage models in any Sega racer I know of, but I shrug it off because A. wrecks have no real effect on car performance and B. pit stops miraculously rid your car of all cosmetic damage.  This is apparently different in real life since stock cars can take even the slightest of hits and they may be done for the day.

Besides, think of this--when a few cars wreck and a caution comes out, it's "cool" to see the wreck, but then the action stops for a few minutes.  Is that what you want to see?  Maybe time for a restroom break I guess.

EDIT: Dale Jr. lost his cool after the race and says that anyone who likes these race results are "bloodthirsty."  Said he would quit if every race ran that way.  I know he was frustrated at the moment (I was too for Junior) but I agree--if you want to see wrecks, go watch a damn destruction derby.  Or play Burnout.  I mean, G-dammit, not every car needs to get smashed like a pinata.  I'm f***in sick of it too.

But what can you say?  If there were no wrecks, then there would be no fear or excitement of going fast and apparently, too long of a green flag stretch would bore viewers out of their minds.  So as long as stock cars race, wrecks will happen and that's the breaks.  You live with it, even if it hurts your poor little feelings.  It's like finding out about the poor baby turtles on the beach trying to swim into the ocean and many get mauled by seagulls and crabs and it sucks ass but what can you do about it?  NOTHING.

Sheesus...I made a post about wrecks in racing like two years ago.  A damn good post too.  And basically all this crash talk illustrates why I have so much disdain for wreck 'em racers like Burnout and Split-Second. But I don't want to talk about those two anymore cause they make me vehemently ill when I do.

Tony Stewart the insane maniac, always looking out for the fans.
A figure 8 in NASCAR...holy s***, give this guy a cigar.

Oh, and one more thing.  Don't give me this nonsense about how NASCAR is all about the wrecks and Formula 1 is the real deal.  I think I've seen about three F1 races this season where there was a wreck ON THE FIRST TURN of the race.  Monaco, Suzuka, and some other one that got a month's worth of footage on Speed Channel (cause some driver's head was nearly taken out by a flying car).  Besides, those that talk down of NASCAR and say F1 is better probably don't watch F1 either--they're just sticking it to the rednecks.  Screw 'em, I love F1 cars but I love them stock cars too.  BOOGITY BOOGITY BOOGITY!!!

NASCAR Is Very Serious Business (Kurt Busch Sucks)

At last night's Sprint Cup race at Bristol, Tony Stewart was contesting for the lead when he got in a wreck with Matt Kenseth.  Afterwards, Tony gets furious and throws his helmet at Matt's car.  Tony went from leader to finishing 27th just like that.  EDIT: Replaced video cause some idiot took first one down.

Now that video makes Tony look like a fat old man.  Also, Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing Transformed spokeswoman Danica Patrick wrecked too (to nobody's surprise) late in the race (was still on the lead lap, amazing) and pointed at instigator Regan Smith as he drove by.  So it was old-school racing at its finest and everyone got angry.  Lol, you mad?

But Tony's helmet toss is not surprising.  Just for fun, here are clips of people getting mad and swearing for the camera.  Warning: PG-13 Language.

And then there's Kurt Busch who is in a league of his own.  You know about his younger brother Kyle who is an asshat, but he clearly learned everything from older brother Kurt.

You could fill an entire 90-minute special on Kurt's antics.  Oh wait, someone already has!!!  The first 50 minutes or so are about Kurt picking fights with practically every other NASCAR driver.  If you want to skip to the good stuff, I'd say go to 55 minutes and watch that.

Not a coincidence that Kurt was fired from Penske Racing in 2011.  He was picked up by Phoenix Racing in 2012 and his luck has turned for the worse (his car sucks).  Even worse, his #51 car is unsponsored since no one wants to be involved with such a troublemaker as him.  Guess what, Kurt?

Courtesy of lolracepics.com

Speaking of arguments between drivers about who instigated a wreck and who's the dirty driver and so forth (the kind that would result in fights over Forza, iRacing, etc.) , NASCAR seldom penalizes drivers in these situations unless it's blatantly obvious/reckless on a certain driver's part.  Otherwise, it comes down to vigilante justice.  If a fellow driver treats you with courtesy & makes clean passes, you return the favor.  If he rubs elbows with you, then you rub him back.  You can type "X gets pissed at Y" in YouTube for anyone and see how these rivalries occur.  What goes around comes around--since Kurt was hated by every other NASCAR driver at some point, he is basically abused by everyone in return.

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I will go ahead and say this: I think auto racing, both in real life and in video games, is probably the most anger-inducing of all sporting events.  Racing?  As opposed to something more violent like football or Call of Duty?  Seriously, I've heard things on Forza that make Call of Duty kids seem pious.  Ignoring the little Xbox Live kids who curse up a storm because they're too immature to be playing games anyway, let me explain why.  There are three factors:

1. You're on your own.

There's two types of competitive sports/games--teams and solo games.  Team games include soccer, football, basketball, baseball, hockey, Call of Duty/FPSes in general.  Solo games include golf, tennis, auto racing IRL and in games, fighting games, chess & poker (I suppose they count).  Yeah, sure, auto racing is a team effort--you have crews and fellow drivers assisting you, but in the end one person raises that trophy and that's you.

The good thing about being on a team is that you usually have fallback options.  If you're doing poorly--either you make one or two bad plays or need to be benched from the game altogether, at least you have your teammates to pick up the slack and hopefully make a few great plays, guide the team to victory, and make up for your mediocrity.  Sure, it sucks for you but at least you still "won."

However, in solo sports, it's all up to you.  If you play poorly and/or lose, there's really no one to blame other than yourself.  If you're having a bad day or are embarrassed, there's no evading it.  You need to keep your composure and finish the entire length of the event, take the loss, and face the music, knowing "I coulda/shoulda/woulda done better but I didn't and I lost, shame on me."  Yet some can't come to grips with losing which is why we kick and scream when that happens.

2. All it takes is one mistake to ruin the race.

Thinking about other games like football, soccer, Call of Duty, even solo sports like tennis & golf, etc., if you make a few terrible plays, such as a turnover or you die a few times, it's not the end of the game.  You can still catch up.  If the other team wins a few rounds/sets/holes and there's still some time left to play, at least you can outplay them later and make it an even game.

However, in racing, all it really takes is one or two miscues and you wreck and are set VERY FAR back.  Well, it depends on the game--in Mario Kart, crashes are expected to happen but in racing "sims," the penalty is much more severe.  It's so easy to just graze the other person's car and you're both flying.  Hopefully, it's a very light wreck and you're only set back about 10-15 seconds or so (Forza) and you can make the comeback assuming you race your ass off and/or the people in front of you screw up too.

But that doesn't take damage into consideration.  If that wreck dings your bumper, congratulations--your aerodynamics are shot which slows you down and makes it even more difficult to win.  Even worse, the engine/transmission could be shot which means you have to putter around the track at half-speed just to come in second to last as opposed to dead last in order to garner a few more points for the standings.  No worse feeling than that.

Now Forza is bad.  Playing with sim settings is awful once you hit the wall and dread trying to finish, but at least you can start a new race a few minutes later.  So think of it from a NASCAR driver's standpoint.  Each week you travel across the country to a new track.  You take the car out for numerous practice sessions, tune the thing over and over and over and over again to make sure it's just right.  Then you race.  Halfway through the race, the car spins out and smashes to pieces.  That's some hundreds of thousands of dollars of equipment GONE in seconds and it probably wasn't your fault.  Plus that entire week was in vain as you finish in the bottom third of the standings and have to do it all over again next week and hope the results are better.  That's just aggravating to think about--I would be cursing too if that happened.

3. Driving is a strenuous ordeal.

Even though sports on a high level, such as football, soccer, baseball, basketball, etc. require extreme fitness, at the very least you get breaks.  You can stop for Gatorade, you can call timeouts, sit on the bench, halftime, hit the showers, etc.  Yet in auto racing, that seldom ever happens.  The race begins and it lasts for some 3-4 hours.  Yes, there's yellow flags (and the rare red flag) which means you're not exerting yourself nonstop.  But to sit in that confined car in that racing suit & helmet of yours and experience those G-forces for that period of time is tough.  BTW, did we mention the possibility of unexpected wrecks, wild rides, injury, death???

As an aside: I still fail to believe some of the things in this video, like the 13 pounds of water weight (I imagine they would be unconscious if they were in a 130-F oven being tossed around for 4 hours without a drop of water) but SportsScience tends to paint athletes as these gladiators who are able to ascends to the heavens and wrestle the gods while us plebians need help to even get up out of bed and use the bathroom cause we're so weak (or something).  But you get the idea, racing is tough.

I suppose this also applies to video games to a much lesser extent (well duh).  There's no pauses in the action--the entire game is nonstop "keep moving."  And that can be tough since the goal is always to move forward--you can't slow down for anything (i.e. "let's regroup" in FPS games and stuff) and hence your mind is always racing, trying to keep the car in equilibrium while simultaneously taking additional factors into play like other drivers trying to cut you off and so forth.  Just something to think about.

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Now you know why NASCAR is so hard and why drivers like Kurt Busch get hot under the collar--CAUSE IT'S TOUGH BUSINESS.

BTW, I didn't know this happened at the Daytona 500, hilarious:

NASCAR Drama: Tony Stewart Wins

Oh yes, NASCAR is a strange thing, even if you don't like watching it...

So today was the last race of the season at Homestead, FL.  Carl Edwards and Tony Stewart were the last two drivers who had a shot at winning the championship.  Whoever won the race won the whole thing.  The point difference between the two was that close.  Actually, the score was tied at the end of the race, but Tony won the tiebreaker purely because he won more races than Carl.  Spoiler Alert: Yes, Tony won the race.


6:30 is when it gets interesting.

In the final couple of laps, the Top 2 drivers were Carl Edwards and Tony Stewart.  Seriously, it was almost movie-esque that both drivers would rise to the occasion and completely smoke the rest of the crowd.  You figured at least one of them would run into bad luck or simply fall behind but no.  Actually, Tony had some back luck (some wreck debris hit his grill but did no serious damage) and fell back to around 30-ish position but he came back again and again.  The rest of the pack just parted like the Red Sea to allow these two to race.  It was a drag race to the finish for both of them.

There were two rain delays.  After the rain and a few caution flags 38 laps were all that remained.  Tony was in 1st, Carl was in 2nd.  And I swear, watching this live, you KNEW that Stewart was going to win.  The possibility of a spinout or mistake was completely out of the picture.  It was destiny.  He drove PERFECT laps.  He drove like a madman.  And so did Carl cause he was able to hang with him.  Tony had a one-second lead on Carl the entire 38 laps.  That lead never deviated from there.  Nothing could have stopped Tony outside of an Act of God or running out of gas on the final lap Dale Jr-style.  And all Carl could do was finish second.

I don't have a preference on who won or not.  It's great that Tony won his 3rd championship but damn, Carl really deserve a lot of credit for giving Tony a run for his money.  Seriously, if Tony didn't drive out of his mind, Carl would've won the championship, hands down.  He congratulated Tony after the race...ran up to Tony's car and gave him a handshake.  Took the loss like a champ.  He deserves credit for being the best loser in NASCAR history...well at least in the last few hours of history.  I'm not brimming with NASCAR knowledge here, please bear with me.

Tony Stewart & Carl Edwards.

And I also must say something about Jimmie Johnson.  He won the last FIVE championships.  Yes, FIVE IN A ROW.  An unprecedented streak.  But he missed his chance for a sixth.  You know he was bound to lose eventually.  Well, that's life.  You can't win them all.  It's nice to win as many as possible, but as long as you keep trying to win, you'll lose.  And thus is the harsh reality of competition but there is something to learn from losing.  Carl Edwards was a good sport about it and said it made him a mentally tougher person.

Heh, Tony SMOKED the Duck...funny joke.

Congrats to everybody (except for classless Kyle Busch, CONGRATULATIONS, YOU JUST LOST YOUR SPONSORS!)...sad there won't be any NASCAR until the new season in February.  The next Daytona 500!!!  Will Dale Jr. finally win a race next season???  Tune in to find out!!!