Busch Series Conundrum

The continued deterioration of what began as NASCAR's Late Model Sportsman series - today known as the Busch Series - has brought increased attention toward what to do, and some rather odd ideas are springing up. The oddest is converting BGN cars to "pony" car specs - Ford Mustang, Chevrolet Camaro, Dodge Challenger, and Toyota Solara.

The argument in favor of this is that it constitutes a clean slate with completely different cars from Nextel Cup. Such a change, it is argued, "would limit the value of running Saturday Busch races to gain data for the Sunday Nextel Cup race."

This, though, is false. The data gained from running Saturday races is far too great for switching racecars to alter, especially given limitations on testing that NASCAR refuses to recognize are a failure and the biggest mistake they've done in over twenty years. NASCAR pony cars would not handle so differently from Winston Cup cars to dissuade Buschwacking - if anything, we're seeing the answer to that argument in the entry of Winston/Nextel Cup drivers in Truck races that serve as Saturday undercards at certain tracks.

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That such ideas are getting some consideration indicates that the kind of hard, unpopular, but effective changes that a conundrum like this require are being ignored. This is not what real leadership entails. Leadership entails making unpopular decisions, because unpopular decisions tend to be the right ones.

The unpopular choice is the one that will actually work - an outright ban on Nextel Cup participation in BGN races. Banning the Buschwackers has always been recommended by series regulars going back to L.D. Ottinger and Jack Ingram in the 1970s, back when the series was not the touring series it is today and when drivers like Bobby Allison, Darrell Waltrip, and Lennie Pond drove Winston Cup and Sportsman races (and usually won them at places like Charlotte and Daytona) and teams like Petty Enterprises, Junie Donlavey, DiGard, Junior Johnson, and Rod Osterlund entered Sportsman cars.

How can banning Nextel Cup participation help BGN? For starters, it frees up purse and sponsorship monies that can better serve BGN regulars, and also switches press coverage toward series regulars. The immediate counter-argument is that there are virtually no legitimate BGN regulars as drivers or teams to make a viable series now. This is true, and a damning indictment of NASCAR and the Buschwackers. Undoing the damage of four-decades of Buschwacking is a daunting task, but it is one that NASCAR can undertake by switching some the their TV and other outside revenue into BGN purses, promotions, searches for sponsors for teams - all the big and little things a sanctioning body is supposed to do for a series anyway.

Pony cars are not the answer for BGN - the answer is for NASCAR to put its foot down and ban Buschwacking, then start spending serious money on the series.