NASCAR announced Wednesday that they have made some small changes to their 2010 testing policy extending and easing somewhat the one year moratorium on testing. And while teams still won’t be allowed to test on tracks that host races in the top three touring series, they can test at any of the NASCAR-sanctioned tracks that host a regional touring event but do not host a national series event.
The final sentence is the punch line by the way.
NASCAR’s moratorium, or ‘ban’ to you and me, on testing was meant with all the best of intentions when it was first instituted. The theory was teams would save money by not being allowed to test. An offshoot of the ‘ban’ was the hope that the lack of testing would help the smaller teams who could ill afford to spend a great deal of money on testing, become more competitive with the larger teams and their deeper pockets.
The reality is of course that the testing ‘ban’ isn’t really a ‘ban’ at all. Instead of testing in the open at NASCAR sanctioned tracks, teams have simply decided to quietly test at dozens of non-NASCAR sanctioned tracks scattered around the country.
At short tracks like New Smyrna Speedway in Florida to Superspeedways like Texas World Speedway in College Station Texas, and even places like Toyota’s testing facility in Arizona teams who can afford to have been testing.
The point being that while NASCAR has instituted a testing ‘ban’, the larger teams with more cash have been testing unabated.
There really haven’t been any secrets when it comes to this testing. Drivers and team members have talked about it openly while NASCAR seems to have turned a blind eye to the practice.
It’s kind of like the old comedy sketch from Monty Python with the line ‘wink, wink, nudge, nudge.’ NASCAR knows what’s going on and has done nothing to stop it. 
But just what can NASCAR do to stop teams from testing at non-sanctioned tracks?
Plenty.
If NASCAR were serious about not letting teams conduct testing, anywhere, then they could easily refuse entry to that team for a race.
Instead, they open up more tracks and condone the practice be letting teams test ‘legally’ at a few select tracks. This however simply destroys the spirit the testing ban was intended for. Only the teams that can still afford to test will test, those that couldn’t before, still won’t be able to.
And now NASCAR opens up a few more tracks?
The sport of NASCAR for competitors is suffering, with sponsors pulling out every week (both Richard Childress Racing and Robby Gordon lost sponsors last week). And for the smaller teams its even worse. Witness Bobby Labonte last week at Loudon. Had Labonte not been able to pull together some last minute sponsorship, literally the Saturday night before the race, he would have become the latest trend; a ‘start and park’. That’s a team that starts the race, then parks the car and pockets that part of the purse given to last place.
No doubt TRG Motorsports, the team Labonte raced for last week, wishes they had enough money to test. They are having a hard enough time just making races, much less even thinking about testing.
For the big teams, Hendricks, Roush, Childress, Gibbs though testing has continued.
If NASCAR were serious about saving money on testing, they would call for complete ban on the practice, not open up more tracks.
Although a smaller group, Formula One has banned testing. And they are serious about keeping teams from testing. If you’re caught testing, anywhere, anytime, then you won’t be allowed to enter the next event, and the driver stands the risk of losing their all important ‘superlicense’ meaning the FIA, Formula One’s sanction body, won’t allow that driver in the paddock, much less on a race track.
Is there any ‘secret’ testing going on in Formula One? No. Because not only is it policed by the FIA but the teams police each other as well.
So either NASCAR imposes a complete and total ban on testing everywhere, or open up every track and testing once again.
But to add some tracks makes it seem like it’s the same as it ever was, or to borrow another line from Monty Python:
"Snap snap, grin grin, wink wink, nudge nudge, say no more.”
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Comments
So, does NASCAR have a testing ban or a testing policy? Seems to me they have a policy on testing, not a ban. If a particular action is "banned" that simply means you can no longer do it, under any circumstances. When you make a "policy" that gives people some guidelines to operate within and still do it. NASCAR should just call it what it is...a policy on testing, not a ban. I'm sure it's a shot in the arm financially to some of these "non-raced" tracks when the teams do show up to test. And in today's suffering economy every little bit helps. However, with the Big 4 being the only teams that can afford to test, they will continue to dominate and the smaller teams will continue to learn how to work the "start and park." I'll use the new catch phrase in NASCAR to sum up my opinion..."It is what it is."
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