old daytona in nascar

[rt green]

just for fun, how do you think a unrestricted dodge Daytona just like in the day would fair in todays nascar? more pit stops? should keep up in speed?  your thoughts..........................................................................                                                                                           ok then, how about a 2015 prepped 69 Daytona?

[Ponch ®]

I assume youre talking about a NASCAR Daytona race car from back in the day?

Tire, fuel delivery/management, suspension, and chassis tech today is way above anything imaginable in 1969-1970.

It would probably get its ass handed to it. May be able to get up to competitive speeds on straightaways and at the big tracks (Daytona/'Dega), but it wouldn't even be close anywhere else where handling is required.

If by 2015 prepped you mean basically a Daytona-style fabbed body built on a modern NASCAR chassis/motor, etc...well, now youre talking. But then it wouldnt really be a Daytona, would it?

[rt green]

no i guess not. just was thinking how one would stack up. i hope it wouldnt finish last.

[Ponch ®]

no i guess not. just was thinking how one would stack up. i hope it wouldnt finish last.

hard to say, but it probably would. Aside from everything else, Im thinking its biggest drawback would be having to make more pit stops for fuel and tires. Just speculating here, because I really don't know, but its possible that even if it had modern NASCAR tires, the car's weight and the way the suspensions and all that were set up in the old cars would probably wear them out faster.

It'd be an interesting (and totally feasible) experiment too. Unlike the current "Brady or Montana - Best QB ever?" debate that's going around but is all academic, it wouldn't be impossible to put a Daytona prepped to 1969 race standards and a modern Cup car on the same track and see what they each can do.

[Aero426]

It is hard to compare the two.   They really are apples to oranges.     The reality is the Daytona has a much more upright windshield and a pretty big frontal area.    It is 600 pounds heavier,  on a narrower hard tire and uses an engine that makes 250 HP less on the best of days.      

The current design McRacecars are capable of qualifying over 200 mph at places like Michigan.  That is 40 mph faster than 1970.  

[rt green]

mcracecars. LOL!  thats funny

[myk]

no i guess not. just was thinking how one would stack up. i hope it wouldnt finish last.

It'd be an interesting (and totally feasible) experiment too. Unlike the current "Brady or Montana - Best QB ever?" debate that's going around but is all academic, it wouldn't be impossible to put a Daytona prepped to 1969 race standards and a modern Cup car on the same track and see what they each can do.

I'd pay to see that one...

[c00nhunterjoe]

I would pay to go watch that race, and i dont like nascar! I still say it should be like it was in the 60's. Race what you sell in the showroom, not a tube chassis shell with stickers.

[JB400]

  With modern tires, I'd say the Daytona would leave the field, if not even lap it.  It was built in a time when most cars run by themselves.  Today's cars have to run in packs to get the speed.  The only advantage I see the new cars having is the pit stops.  The jack man has farther to travel with the Daytona.  Of course, I hope we're just running on the same tracks the Daytona only run on, and not tracks like Bristol and Martinsville.

  A modern day Daytona wouldn't fair too well.  Brian France wouldn't allow it to be dominate.

[myk]

I would pay to go watch that race, and i dont like nascar! I still say it should be like it was in the 60's. Race what you sell in the showroom, not a tube chassis shell with stickers.

Damn straight.  I don't know what to call oval track racing these days, but NASCAR ain't it...

[Ponch ®]

I would pay to go watch that race, and i dont like nascar! I still say it should be like it was in the 60's. Race what you sell in the showroom, not a tube chassis shell with stickers.

Damn straight.  I don't know what to call oval track racing these days, but NASCAR ain't it...

we're gonna have that argument again? LOL

The cars may have looked cool, but the racing was boring as hell.

"And Richard Petty wins the race....Benny Parsons will come in 2nd place, 3 laps down...Bobby Allison in 3rd place, 7 laps down..."

[myk]

Isn't that the way it is now?

[Aero426]

On the big tracks in 1970, two to three cars on the lead lap at the end was typical.   That doesn't mean the racing during the race was bad.     If the product was bad, the fans wouldn't have come.  

Today, you have a sort of a contrived competition where due to the quality of the equipment and a small box for the rules, that you can have 27 cars on the lead lap in cars so safe that the drivers have no fear of crashing each other out on the last lap by "going for it".    I don't know that that is "better racing".    It's just a different animal.  

[Ponch ®]

On the big tracks in 1970, two to three cars on the lead lap at the end was typical.   That doesn't mean the racing during the race was bad.     If the product was bad, the fans wouldn't have come.  

Today, you have a sort of a contrived competition where due to the quality of the equipment and a small box for the rules, that you can have 27 cars on the lead lap in cars so safe that the drivers have no fear of crashing each other out on the last lap by "going for it".    I don't know that that is "better racing".    It's just a different animal.  

the fans went because there was nothing else going on, if you think about it. There were no Carolina Panthers, Nashville Predators, etc. College football was only a couple of months a year. NASCAR was the sport if you lived in the south during that period.