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 2023 NASCAR Mid-Season Report By Brian H Cotnoir With the 2023 NASCAR Season a little more than half-way through, there is so much to talk about during NASCAR History 75th season.   We've seen some surprising winners, some career comebacks, and a return to Victory Lane for some drivers. CUP SERIES Biggest Surprise I know a lot of people are assuming I'm going to name Shane Van Gisbergen's debut win at the Chicago Street Course as the biggest surprise of the season, but I actually think so far the biggest surprise is Ricky Stenhouse Jr.'s win at the Daytona 500.   All three of Stenhouse's Cup Series win have come at Superspeedway races, but it was most surprising is how little of a factor Stenhouse has still played in the season.  Other than the win at Daytona Stenhouse's only other Top 5 this season was a fourth place at the Bristol Dirt Race.  Stenhouse is still presently locked into the playoffs, but I don't expect him to make it out of the Round of...

 5 More Auto Racing Facts that sound made up (but are true) By Brian H Cotnoir 1.)  Carl Edwards 1st two wins in NASCAR happened the same weekend Carl Edwards had a fantastic start to his 2005 NASCAR Cup Season.   He made his full-time debut in the NASCAR Busch and Cup Series for Roush Fenway Weekend and did something that no other driver in the Series has done scored his first two wins in the same weekend.   Edwards won the Busch Series race at Atlanta and then the next afternoon beating Jimmie Johnson by 0.02 seconds. 2.)  Dick Hagey drove a Volkswagen Beetle in a NASCAR race What if I told you that one race some driver decided to enter a Volkswagen Beetle, and no I'm not talkinga bout the Disney film "Herbie: Fully Loaded".   In 1953, Philadelphia native Dick Hagy entered a Volkswagen Beetle in a race at the infamous Langhorne Speedway in Pennsylvania.  Hagey qualified 32nd out of 38 entrants in the race and scored a surprising 19th p...

 In Defense of Scott Riggs By Brian H Cotnoir Layne Riggs is one of the up & coming drivers on the CARS Late Model Tour.  It's not surprising, Layne's father, Scott was once one touted as an up & comer in NASCAR twenty years ago.   Scott Riggs, certainly looked like he had a bright future ahead of him in NASCAR, but once he finally reached the NASCAR Cup Series, his success began to dwindle.   Like many other drivers I've talked about, Scott Riggs lack of success in the Cup Series have led many to often label him as a "NASCAR Bust", but there's more to his career than what most people remember. Riggs began running part-time in the NASCAR Truck Series in 1999.   The following season in 2000, Riggs scored eight Top 10 finishes while running part-time for three different Truck Series teams.   Riggs results was enough to attract a full-time offer to drive in the Truck Series for Ultra Motorsports.  Riggs started off the season w...

 5 "I'd rather be lucky than good" moments in Auto Racing By Brian H Cotnoir 1.)  Tom Sneva wins the 1978 IndyCar Championship without winning a race Tom Sneva defended his 1977 USAC IndyCar Championship in 1978, but he did it all this time without winning a single race.    Sneva won the Championship by a comfortable 122 points over Al Unser Sr. who won 3 races that season, including that year's Indy 500.  However, Al Unser Sr. had to miss two rounds due to injury.   Danny Ongais scored a career high 5 wins that season and only managed to finish 8th place that season.  Even Mario Andretti running a partial schedule won an IndyCar race that season while dominating the F1 Championship that year for Lotus F1 in Europe.   During the 18-race season, Sneva finished runner-up a total of 6 times, and finished in the Top 3 in 10 times that season.   This was more than enough to make up for his lack of wins on the season. 2.)  Jamie...

 5 Things I'm looking forward to in the 2023 NASCAR season. By Brian H Cotnoir We are Officially one month away from the start of the 2023 NASCAR Season!  Thank God!  I feel like it's been 10 years since the Championship Weekend in Phoenix, and honestly this season is the most I've looked forward to in a long time.  I'm still riding the high of watching my favorite driver, Christopher Bell, get two walk-off wins in the Playoffs and make the Championship 4, and I believe there will be plenty more to look forward to this season.  So here are 5 Things I'm looking forward to in the 2023 NASCAR Season 1.)  Kyle Busch (and KBM's) switch to Chevy I believe Kyle Busch will do great things at Richard Childress Racing and his return to GM, but I don't think I'll be the only one who will take some getting used to driving anything other than a Toyota.   I mean, Kyle Busch made Toyota what it is today in NASCAR.   He won everything (minus a Daytona ...

5 Best Drivers who never won the Daytona 500 By Brian H Cotnoir In football the biggest accomplishment a player can achieve is winning the Super Bowl.  In baseball it's winning the World Series, and in Hockey it's hoisting the Stanley Cup.  All these events happen at the end of the season, but NASCAR is the only sport I know whose biggest event opening race of the season.   Winning the Daytona 500 is one of the biggest accomplishments a driver can achieve in NASCAR, and even if the only race you win in your career it cements your legacy as a Daytona 500 Champion.  The biggest names in the sport: Dale Earnhardt, Richard Petty, Jeff Gordon, Jimmie Johnson, Bobby Allison, Junior Johnson, and Bill Elliott have all won the Daytona 500.  However, many other well-known drivers in the sport have never won the Daytona 500 but have come oh so close and several occasions.  Today, I'm going to talk about 5 of those drivers who never who won just about everything i...

5 Lesser-known facts about racecar drivers By Brian H Cotnoir I think the title speaks for itself.   I hope you all enjoy it. 1.) The Unser Family has won the Pikes Peak Hillclimb 26 times! The Unser family name is typically synonymous with the Indianapolis 500.  Al Unser Sr. won the race a record 4-times (a record he shares with 3 other driver), his brother Bobby Unser won the race 3 times, and his son Al Unser Jr. has won the race twice. However, there's another racing circuit where the Unser's have truly dominated, and that is the Pikes Peak Hill Climb.  Despite the fact that it's not an actual racetrack, the over 12-mile hill climb, was part of the AAA/USAC Schedule & Championship. (Predecessor to the IndyCar Series) from 1946 to 1970.  I know a lot of people think it's strange that the Indy 500 was part of the F1 Calendar for 10 years, but I think the Pikes Peak Hillclimb being a part of the IndyCar schedule is even stranger. The race has been won the U...

 2022 NASCAR Season Report Card By Brian H Cotnoir CUP SERIES BEST RACE(s) There were a number of good races during the 2022 NASCAR Cup Series season.  In my opinion the best races this season were all during the playoffs.  Erik Jones won his second career Southern 500 and brought Petty GMS Racing back to Victory Lane.  Chris Buescher helped RFK Racing get back to Victory Lane to the following weekend.  Hands down the best race was Martinsville, Christopher Bell and Ross Chastain snuck their way into the NASCAR Playoffs in the penultimate race of the season. WORST RACE(s) The Worst Race of the season was hands down the final race of the Regular Season finale at Daytona.  Now, I was skeptical about moving the race from its traditional 4th of July weekend from the start, but between the frequent Red Flags for rain, the race was an absolute sh!t show.  Austin Dillon pulled off the upset victory, but other than that it was a terrible race. BIGGEST SURPRISE...

Requiem for Brandon Brown By Brian H Cotnoir On October 1, 2022, Brandon Brown made what--in all likelihood--would be his last start in his #68 Brandonbilt Motorsports.   Almost one year to the day where he shocked the NASCAR world by winning his first career victory in the Xfinity Series for his family-owned team, his once promising NASCAR career went out with a whimper finishing 33rd out of 38 drivers.    What should have been the greatest day of the Virgina drivers' life in 2021 would be become marred in controversy and he would unintentionally become a focal point of a Right-Wing Political Ideology, that his career could never recover from.   The first time I remember hearing Brandon Brown's name was when legendary college basketball announcer, Dick Vitale declaring that Brown would win the season opening Truck Race at Daytona in 2016.  Now, I value Dick Vitale's knowledge and opinion on College Basketball, but when I heard this on ESPN, I remember...

In Defense of Steve Grissom By Brian H Cotnoir My most powerful memory of NASCAR driver Steve Grissom was during a race at Atlanta in 1997.   I was only seven years old, and I remember seeing his #41 Kodiak Chevy spin down the back stretch before backing into the inside concrete wall and flipping violently as his gas tank was thrown from car and erupted in a fireball.  I remember watching this on TV in the living room because I can still recall my father's reaction to the wreck "He's gone!   Nobody can survive that!" and I started to cry, because I thought he really was killed in the wreck.   Fortunately, Steve Grissom survived the wreck and would be back in his car two races later at Texas Motor Speedway.   That wreck in Atlanta wasn't a career-defining moment for Grissom, but unfortunately many of his accomplishments in NASCAR have been overshadowed by a lackluster Cup Career and being a part of some of NASCAR's most tragic moments....