March 7, 2010. Atlanta Motor Speedway in Hampton, Georgia. The laps are winding down. Kurt Busch is doing his best to fend off a hard charging Juan Pablo Montoya, hungry for his first win on an oval. With just 3 laps left in the race as Busch and JPM head into turns one and two, the FOX TV cameras cut to a car upside down in the air, slamming into the outside wall. “I don’t know if I’m ok,” Brad Keselowski, the driver of the mangled race car said over the in-car radio, but he eventually climbed out of the car, and was ok. The other car in this incident? Carl Edwards’ 99 Ford.
The previous season, Edwards and Keselowski had gotten into a crash coming to the finish line at Talladega for the win, which involved Edwards’ 99 hitting the catch fence. Even earlier in that fateful Atlanta race, Edwards and Keselowski got into an incident, ruining Edwards’ day. With 3 to go, BK was running in the top ten when he approached the lapped 99, who hooked him on the front stretch. The car initially spun, but soon the rear of the vehicle picked up off the ground. The 12 car did a backflip before violently slamming into the outside wall roof first. Thankfully, Keselowski emerged from the car. Carl Edwards was promptly parked for the remainder of the race for aggressive driving.
So why am I telling you the story of a freak accident from 10 years ago? Because this is what broke the straw on the camel’s back for NASCAR. Even though Edwards wanted to wreck Brad, we can reasonably expect he didn’t want to flip him. It seemed to be a normal spin until the car had gone completely backwards. That’s when the car suddenly picked up and flipped. But why? It was the wing on the back of the car. In 2009 at Talladega (both races as a matter of fact) a car had been turned completely around and flipped. The aforementioned Edwards wreck in April, and Ryan Newman flipped on top of Kevin Harvick’s car in October. 3 very similar looking wrecks (2 of them DANGEROUSLY close to the grandstands) was just too much. NASCAR removed the wing after the Martinsville race 2 weeks later, and replaced it with a spoiler, which has remained ever since (yes the spoiler flipped too, but not as easily as the wing).
But lately, I’ve been thinking, what if Brad Keselowski’s car stayed completely on the ground? What if the wing hadn’t picked up his car? Would the wing still exist today? Obviously these will all be hypothetical as the wing is gone now, but these questions still loom in my mind. How many more wrecks would it have taken to trash the wing? The car itself was not taken lightly by fans and even drivers. After the very first race with the new cars, race winner Kyle Busch said, on national TV, “I can’t stand to drive them. They suck.” Fans complained of its appearance as well, particularly to the rear wing. Especially as this is when viewership of NASCAR began to slide, this new unpopular car wasn’t helping. Larry McReynolds said during the caution for BK’s Atlanta flip, “I’m like you, Darrell [Waltrip], I’m gonna be so glad to see that rear spoiler back on these cars.”
So the car itself was not well-perceived by the NASCAR community from fans to drivers to even the media, so I wouldn’t have seen it lasting on the gen-6 car. Even now then gen-6 isn’t very appreciated by the community, but it’s far better than the wing. But I do see it lasting through until 2012, which was the last year of the Car of Tomorrow. When the new car gets introduced, I see the wing being scrapped. As for the amount of wrecks it’d take to get the wing removed? I’m sure there were plenty of instances where a car or maybe even cars would turn over. Possibly one or two additional catch-fence crashes. A lot of questions to consider about the wing and the Car of Tomorrow as a whole. One of the most controversial periods in NASCAR history remains one of the most mysterious periods.
Your guess on this topic is as good as mine. Follow me on Twitter and let me know your opinions on the wing, and the Car of Tomorrow as a whole!
Motor Max 