NASCAR should postpone Richmond Cup race
Bob Pockrass
Bob Pockrass began covering NASCAR in 1992, primarily covering short-track racing and events. He has worked for Street & Smith's Motorsports Group since 2003.
RICHMOND, Va. – It’s 7:30 a.m. at Richmond International Raceway, and it’s time for NASCAR to postpone the Sprint Cup race scheduled for Saturday night.
NASCAR could have done that already or at least told people about a contingency plan as the area awaits Tropical Storm Hanna. The problem with that is they don’t want people not to come if they could get this race off as scheduled. Still, NASCAR would have been totally justified in already telling people that they’re running the Cup event Sunday.
With the National Weather Service predicting possibly 1-2 inches of rain tonight and 3-4 inches by Saturday, there is no way NASCAR should be racing Saturday.
There are too many police and too many rescue personnel on site who will be needed elsewhere. There are campers here who probably would have to leave because weathering that kind of storm at the track isn’t the safest thing.
Fans at RIR proved last year that they will show up for a Sunday afternoon race. Granted, that was in May last year and not the opening football weekend, but that likely won’t dissuade fans from coming to the race track.
It’s time for NASCAR to surrender to Hanna and run the Cup race Sunday. If it tries to run Saturday and there is a mess, the public relations mess would be a disaster, not to mention the hazardous situation it could be putting its fans in.
Making a decision like this a day early when the weather can change isn’t easy because of the logistics and the possibility that nothing could happen. But when making a decision on the basis of the safety of fans and competitors, defending that decision is easy.
