Up to Speed

2014 in NASCAR was a classic season. It was the second year of the generation 6 car, ESPN and TNT were in their final year of broadcasting. This was the final year of the cars producing 900+ horsepower, which made for broken track records, better racing, and entertaining storylines. Even if Kevin Harvick finally got his maiden championship, This was the first year of the chase grid. The controversial format that decided the champion that many people felt was too random to take seriously. Even if the chase grid 2014 was memorable, what if the points battle was just...you know...points?

Tracking the Data

Here are some of the rules I used when collecting this data. I didn't want to put every team on since any part time drivers took points away from the full timers. So for the sake of keeping focus on the championship battle, any part time cars will not be included (sorry Trevor Bayne and Wood Brothers).

I also wanted to keep the points as simplified as I can. Whenever fans collect full season points, they use the original system created by the late Bob Latford. The winner scored 175 points, the top 5 being distributed by 5 points, 6th-10th distributed by 4 points, and then the rest were distributed by 3 points. 5 bonus points are given to drivers who led at least once or more laps. Despite its simplicity, the format had its issues. Points gaps got so big later on in the season, points battles became very complex to follow along. There was also no extra increment between 1st and 2nd place, meaning second could get as much points as first - even the godfather of the system, Latford, was concerned about this problem devaluing a win by proposing bonus points to the winner.

In 2011, NASCAR simplified the full season points to make each positional increment 1 point. The winner gets an extra 3 bonus points. This is the format I used with my modifications being an extra point for the pole sitter, and 2 extra points for the most laps led driver. Why do these little changes? So that if anyone can sweep all of these bonus points and win the race, they will receive a points total of 50. Hopefully, this will better reward winners and greatly reward dominant drivers.

More info about previous points generations:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xo2aTf3TPNc]

Credit

Uploader: nascarman history Narration: Brock Beard

Champions without Chase

2004 Jeff Gordon (5x) 2005 Tony Stewart (2x) 2006 Jimmie Johnson (1x) 2007 Jeff Gordon (6x) 2008 Carl Edwards (1x) 2009 Jimmie Johnson (2x) 2010 Kevin Harvick (1x) 2011 Carl Edwards (2x) 2012 Brad Keselowski (1x) 2013 Jimmie Johnson (3x)