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Racer Weekly Issue 3: NASCAR, F1 or WRC?
by Dan Dectis Note: These are my opinions. If they piss you off, good, cry about it. Or send some mail to Panoz-GTR@fantasycars.com and I' ll argue with you some more. 
Well this week a sibling of one of my good friends either decided that he was going to try and piss people like me off or he was just plain ignorant. Anyway this young man attempted to make the argument that Jeff
Gordon was the best driver of all time. Now I can attack such arguments from many angles and since this really angered me I plan on attacking from all of them.First of all, the very nature of this
argument acts on the premise that NASCAR drivers are better than other drivers such as Sports Car racers, F1, or even WRC. Now this right here, in my mind, is an
outrageous premise. If you look at the workload of a NASCAR driver compared to that of Sports Car, F1, and most importantly World Rally Championship (WRC), you would realize that there can be no
comparison. Let me just say that this is not to say that NASCAR drivers are not talented, as I'm sure they are. But, as for overall driver skill, I do not think they can compete.  Consider this, NASCAR does 4 maybe 5 turns every lap for say 500
laps. Also the turns are banked so they arent experiencing many lateral Gs. Another thing, if you brake a little late into the turn you go a little bit high on the turn, big deal right?
Suppose you brake a little late in sports car racing, well then you miss your apex by about 5 feet or so and then your time is about 4 tenths slower RIGHT THERE. And suppose its Formula 1, and then the
loss is even greater. Also you run the risk of going right off the road because F1 drivers brake at the absolute last moment. Even more catastrophic is when you miss a brake point in WRC. If you were to
miss your baking point in WRC you might go off the road (and possibly into a forest, over a ravine, into a cliff, anything) and that might end your rally right there, and if you miss it by enough, your life. Now back
to the point of turns per lap. Like I said, NASCAR runs 4 or 5 a lap. Now Formula 1 and Sports Car racers run at least 10 or 11 turns a lap all the way up to 17 or more turns per lap. That makes the driver
load much more as each track has to be learned individually, also there is much more risk per lap. Then what about turns like the Grand Curve at Magne Cours. In this turn F1 cars pull roughly 3.5 lateral Gs
through it. That means if youre head and helmet ways in total 30lbs. That means you need to exert 105lbs of pressure at least to hold your head up through that turn. Then in cases such as that French track, the
drivers must contend with an equally fast turn in the opposite direction, each and every lap. Now Ive just touched base a bit on the physical extremities that these drivers face.
Ok so now we know why it was ignorant to think that NASCAR drivers are superior to other drivers in other forms of motor sport. I must attack the fact that Jeff Gordon is better than all the other drivers. So
this premise wants us to over look names like, Fangio, Hill (Damon, Phil, and Graham), Senna, Schumacher (Ralf and Michael), Rosemayer, Prost, Hakkinnen, Andretti (oh yes, he conquers all), and
Mansell, and thats just in Formula 1 alone, and only those that are off the top of my head! As I said before, Im sure NASCAR drivers have talent, they just fall short of the kind of talent that it takes to run
other, higher forms of motor sport. Also, although I am not a NASCAR fan by any means I do know that there were much better drivers than this man who needs good equipment to win. I dont really know
names but I'm sure a certain Dale Earnhart (who happened to have a foray into sports car racing rather successfully before his death) is much more talented than Mr. Gordon.
Well I guess what it boils down to, regardless of my loathing for NASCAR, is that to say that one driver is the best is a grossly ignorant statement. The way I see it, if a driver is competing in any form of motor
sport that its name is commonly known, well then he is damn good in my book. Although I have much more respect for some drivers than others, I respect each driver to some extent. I mean, in any given
form of motor sport, there are greats and there are not so greats. But people can (and do, trust me I know) argue for hours over who is the best driver in that form alone, not to mention ALL of motor
sports. So I say well just say that its unfair to say that one driver is the best overall, however it is also unfair to say that oval sports such as NASCAR place the same kinds of demands on the driver as racing
such as sportscars, F1 or WRC.
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