More NASCAR Sprint Cup teams need to gamble to win

For the past two weeks, staying out on old tires or just taking two tires have been winning moves for both Regan Smith and Matt Kenseth. The calls came out golden for those two, but maybe more teams need to take late-race gambles even if it doesn’t end up in a victory.

Races can be won several different ways. Having a fast car is a good start, but a fair amount of luck is needed throughout the course of the event, whether it comes down to fuel mileage, tires, or just keeping the car off the wall and out of trouble.

Smith took an opportunity to jump to the front when everybody else hit the pits at Darlington. The same sort of thing worked out Sunday at Dover for Kenseth, although he took two tires and had a lot more distance between him and the four-tire crowd.

This type of strategy won’t turn into a win, or even a top-five finish, every time, but that doesn’t mean teams having a mediocre race should always follow the leader and accept their fate.

I’m always shocked more drivers who are on the back half of the lead-lap cars don’t stay out. Yes, Smith and Brad Keselowski stayed out at Darlington when they were sitting between 10th and 20th, but that means eight other drivers came in for four tires when the only thing they really had to lose was just a couple of spots. Especially with less than 10 laps to go, as was the case in the Southern 500, most of those drivers would’ve finished well ahead of where they did even if they lost several positions on the restart.

Darlington is often considered the track that is the toughest on tires, but it has to be awful inviting to see all of the leaders come in for a stop and have nothing but the pace car ahead. One of the few benefits of being so far behind is the team gets to see what all of the teams ahead of them will do. If all of the leaders are coming in, why not take a shot at winning the race. Even if every single car on the lead lap passed them back, they still would end up close to where they were before the caution.

Sunday’s race was a little different, however, and it was surprising to see Kenseth and Mark Martin, who stayed out and didn’t take any tires, maintain their positions and drive away from the field. But, both had pretty good cars throughout the race, as Smith did at Darlington.

Let's face it, only a handful of teams show up to a race track with a legitimate chance to out-run the field and win a given race. Sure, there are exceptions based on the type of track, but there's usually a lot more teams that could benefit from making a risky call from pit road than could benefit from playing it safe and banking points.

Maybe in future races more teams will be willing to take a gamble on tires late in a race. It would sure keep the season interesting, especially with the new wild-card Chase implications. It could not only get a driver a rare win, but it might just put them in contention for the championship. That would have fans howling, but that’s a topic for another day.

NASCAR and Goodyear try to avoid major tire trouble at Bristol

Tire problems have cropped up on NASCAR and Goodyear again this weekend as the dreaded tire dust showed up around the top of Bristol Motor Speedway on Friday during the opening practice sessions for both the Nationwide and Sprint Cup series.

Instead of the rubber sticking to the racetrack, it was shaved off the tires as the cars drove through the corners and caused excessive tire wear. This year, NASCAR and Goodyear decided to bring a new right-side tire compound, and they quickly found out it was not going to work.

Since the Car of Tomorrow debuted in the Cup series in 2007, Goodyear has struggled to develop a tire that works well with the new car. It has gotten better, however, as Goodyear has had more time to work with the car and tires have become a non-topic most weeks.

The problem came to a head during a debacle at the Brickyard in 2008 where tires came apart after just 10 laps of racing, but there were plenty of other struggles that season, notably the spring race at Atlanta where Tony Stewart smashed Goodyear for a right-side tire that made the cars extremely difficult to drive and a less-than-spectacular race.

“There isn't anybody, I don't think, who is happy with the tires we've got,” Stewart said after that race. “After 10 years in the Cup Series, you learn to be highly disappointed with everything that Goodyear does.”

Thankfully, this time NASCAR and Goodyear were proactive and ordered in 1,300 new right-side tires to use Saturday and Sunday, which were the compound that was used in last year's races at Bristol.

However, this doesn’t excuse how the tire situation for this week got to this point. One would hope Goodyear did proper testing and simulations before bringing a new tire to the racetrack, but that hasn’t been confirmed and there wasn’t a tire test at the racetrack itself leading up to this weekend.

Here’s an idea: Before Goodyear brings a new tire combination to a racetrack, it must have conducted a tire test at that track beforehand. I don’t think this situation would have come up if a tire test had been held at Bristol sometime between the August race and now.

Goodyear typically holds tire tests at tracks that have recently been repaved, such as Daytona this year and Darlington two years ago, but maybe the same needs to be done when a new tire is going to be brought to the track, as well.

NASCAR and Goodyear hopefully avoided another major disaster this weekend. After the exciting start to the season, NASCAR can’t afford a terrible race, especially at Bristol.