Drivers executing desperate moves in a race were a product of NASCAR\u2019s playoff system that promoted win-and-you\u2019re-in, but now with the return to the Chase championship format, three-time NASCAR Cup champion Joey Logano predicts those moments will become extinct.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was a true test of what your morals are in a race car and what you\u2019re OK with,\u201d Logano said about the former playoff system. \u201cDesperate people do desperate things. <\/p>\n
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\u201cYour memory was always reminding yourself of what happened to you. It was a true challenge mentally, deciding what you were OK with and what you weren\u2019t. That type of do or die moment isn\u2019t gonna be here as much anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n
Perhaps the move that motorsports historians will use to define that do-or-die moment is Ross Chastain\u2019s \u201cHail Melon\u201d at Martinsville Speedway in October 2022. On the final lap, Chastain charged into turn three at full throttle, rode the wall through turns three and four, and passed numerous cars to secure his place in the Championship Four. The move was inspired by a video game, but NASCAR banned it before the next season for safety reasons. <\/p>\n
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David Jensen\/\/Getty Images<\/p>\n
Under this year\u2019s format, the win-and-you\u2019re-in scenario and elimination rounds are gone. The top 16 drivers in points at the end of the 26-race regular season will be in the Chase. The championship will then be determined among those 16 drivers with the point leader at the end of the season the title holder. There are those who believe the new system will result in drivers taking fewer chances than they did under the playoff system with its elimination rounds, but Ross Chastain isn\u2019t one of them.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn my opinion, a win is so massive\u2026 in the Cup Series that every driver that straps in on race day is willing to do whatever it takes,\u201d Chastain said. \u201cAny of them that say they won\u2019t try to win with everything they know how to do I don\u2019t think is telling the truth.\u201d <\/p>\n
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Kyle Busch began his full-time Cup career in 2005 when the original 10-driver Chase was in its second season. He recalled that getting wrecked once or twice during the Chase eliminated any chance of winning the title. <\/p>\n
\u201cWith wrecks being a whole heck of a lot more these days, of people running over people, maybe it\u2019ll keep it even because everybody\u2019s getting wrecked in the final 10 (races),\u201d Busch said. <\/p>\n
Busch also says the format won\u2019t eliminate the dive bomb tactic. <\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you watch all the children that race all year long in the ARCAs and the Late Models and other things and you see that stuff already, they\u2019re taught from a very young age to dive bomb and run into them and door that guy,\u201d Busch said. \u201cBeing a dad, I\u2019ve heard those words and maybe I\u2019ve said those words once or twice. I don\u2019t think it (the racing) will change a whole lot.\u201d
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A North Carolina native, Deb Williams is an award-winning motorsports journalist who is in her fourth decade covering auto racing. In addition to covering the sport for United Press International, she has written motorsports articles for several newspapers, magazines and websites including espnW.com<\/a>, USA Today, and The Charlotte Observer. Her awards include the American Motorsports Media Award of Excellence, two-time National Motorsports Press Association writer of the year, and two-time recipient of the Russ Catlin award. She also has won an award in the North Carolina Press Association\u2019s sports feature category.\u00a0 During her career, Deb has been managing editor of GT Motorsports magazine and was with Winston Cup Scene and NASCAR Winston Cup Scene for 18 years, serving as the publication\u2019s editor for 10 years. In 2024 she was inducted into the NMPA Hall of Fame.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Drivers executing desperate moves in a race were a product of NASCAR\u2019s playoff system that promoted win-and-you\u2019re-in, but…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":409305,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[446],"tags":[49,48,782,172317,784,1642,634,172316,82],"class_list":["post-409304","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nascar","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-content-type-news","tag-contentid-b3795a12-a725-4bd7-a744-fbbe0e489886","tag-displaytype-standard-article","tag-locale-us","tag-nascar","tag-shorttitle-drivers-react-to-nascars-championship-reset","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/409304","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=409304"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/409304\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/409305"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=409304"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=409304"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=409304"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}