Until this week I’ve been convinced that the entries or lack thereof in NHRA’s legacy professional classes of Top Fuel, Funny Car, and Pro Stock represented a looming crisis for the NHRA. Because the NHRA won’t change the economics of nitro racing, then economics will ultimately decide the numbers of entries in the legacy pro classes. Short of the NHRA re-inventing the classes to make them affordable or drastically increasing purses, short fields are here to stay. But I don’t think the NHRA management team is overly concerned or worried about that issue.

The Nielsen numbers for this NHRA season - the second straight with short field - aren’t “tanking” and for some races are historically high. If you believe the NHRA they have had multiple “sold out” days at multiple events despite “short fields” for the NHRA legacy pro classes at almost every national event.

Evidently, as long as the NHRA gives its national event audiences the three legacy pro classes with four rounds of qualifying and pro eliminations, the current NHRA fan base has no problem buying tickets.

We may be seeing the beginning of a paradigm shift in policy by the NHRA management. They may have come to the conclusion that while their Top Fuel, Funny Car and Pro Stock are the headliners for their national events they no longer can depend on those classes alone to grow the sport.

I think the biggest indication of that paradigm shift in the NHRA mantra is borne out by the fact that after decades of the legacy pro classes and the Pro Stock Motorcycle class dominating the TV broadcasts to the exclusion of almost any other class, in 2017 viewers are seeing more than an all Top Fuel, Funny Car and Pro Stock broadcast. They are getting serious coverage of the new Nitro Harley pro class, more coverage of the Pro Mod racing, and on a regular basis more sportsman finals.

I think in the near future, given a little PR help and TV exposure, those two “pro classes” will offer racers and sponsors who can’t afford to build or be involved with one of the legacy classes an affordable alternative that doesn’t require millions of dollars to participate. Forget about the argument about too many winners in drag racing; that ship sailed a decade ago.

Why not instead promote all of the winners and classes and in doing so increase the fan base using the best tool they have. Use their TV broadcast to promote and introduce their whole series (with ALL the classes) to a new fan base.

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Just Wondering … When will the major Pro Mod sanctioning bodies (NHRA, PDRA, ADRL) finally admit that there are no rules they can make in their Pro Mod classes that will deliver the mythical “level playing field” between superchargered or turbocharged or nitrous oxide injected cars. The fact is that NHRA Pro Mods using turbochargers can be 6-10 mph faster than either supercharged or nitrous entries and deliver the same ET’s at higher speeds. In the ADRL their most popular and populated class is their Pro Boost class and the rules allow turbocharged cars that are 10-12 mph faster that the best supercharged entries.

Fortunately for the Pro Mod associations the racers don’t seem to care enough to quit.

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I’m declaring the IHRA as conceived and started by Mr. Larry Carrier more than four decades ago to offer drag racers, sponsors and race tracks an alternative to the NHRA to be dead and gone. The once prominent sanctioning body became mostly a non-profit operation after RJ Reynolds was forced by the government to withdraw its sponsorship of auto racing. Despite massive injections of cash from a string of successful businessmen/owners like Billy Meyer, Bill Bader, Feld Entertainment, Live Nation or lastly the Texas Pacific Group through IRGSE, the IHRA struggled mightily and mostly failed to become profitable or a viable alternative to the NHRA.

The question for the ages is what did Jason Rittenberry and later Chris Lencheski tell the TPG board members that convinced them to extended a $40-50 million line of credit (not denied by TPG) to Rittenberry and continue that support after firing Rittenberry and hiring Lencheski?

During the leadership of those two “motorsports executives” they facilitated the purchase of four race tracks, destroyed the iconic World Series of Drag Racing event, and spent an estimated $20-25 million.

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Matt Hagan set the all-time nitro speed record for 1,000 feet at 338.82 mph at Houston breaking the all-time speed record of 337.53 set on the quarter-mile distance at Brainerd in 2005 by Tony Schumacher in the DSR dragster. At that same time Courtney Force also exceeded 338 mph in her JFR Chevrolet at the same event. Where are the rules changes to slow down the Funny Cars?

Wasn’t unsafe, excessive speeds the primary reason the track length was shortened to 1,000 feet due to the lobbying of PRO and NHRA nitro teams back in 2008? As a friend of mine who drives nitro cars said to me when I brought up the speed issue, “I think I’ll be just as dead in a 300-mph crash as I would be in a 340-mph pass.” Good point.

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The thought occurs to me that the NHRA constant efforts to insure maximum traction at their national events in an effort to maximize speeds and ET’s have reached the point of no return. I watched several races recently where for some reason one lane was obviously better than the other and I forced myself to watch another race where lane choice was all important. The NHRA track prep crew, although the best in the world, was unable to fix the track so that both drivers had an equal chance to win. I suggest that part of the problem is that in order to prep the track to the specs the teams want the staff sometimes use every trick they know to make the track right.

If one lane or the other gets damaged and can’t be brought back to perfection the racers in the bad lane are usually screwed.

So here is my suggestion: reduce the track prep traction standard by 30 percent. As long as both lanes are equal no one will complain. It is pretty hard to return one lane to perfect traction; it is not nearly as hard to make it 70% of perfect.

Just a suggestion from a fan who is tired of one-lane race tracks and watching track-prep crews on the race track.