The NASCAR Cup Series race at the Dover Motor Speedway was an intriguing affair, but the Next-Gen car’s issue with shorter tracks persisted big time. Denny Hamlin should have been the biggest talking point seeing how he won the race and all but insiders are more interested in criticizing the overuse of aero-blocking on the mile-long track. Race car driver Landon Cassill was one of the people who shared his opinions on social media, and not many spotters were fans of what he tweeted, including Freddie Kraft.
Are spotters making NASCAR Cup Series races boring?
Cassill shared an update by eminent journalist Jeff Gluck, who reported Kyle Larson stating that blocking was way too easy at Dover and that NASCAR should do something about it. The former Cup Series champion said that NASCAR could get rid of the rear cameras to make it more difficult, but Cassill went a step further. He said that a spotter’s job should just be related to safety and not informing drivers of who is behind them and where. However, Bubba Wallace‘s spotter did not like that and made his opinions clear.
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“I would be supportive of this and even go as far as finding a way to reduce the spotter’s role to safety only. But I do love our spotters, so I will take the heat for this comment,” Cassill tweeted after the race. Kraft shared the tweet and wrote, “To keep my guy “safe” in gonna help him. Aero block to keep other drivers from getting next to us. We learned today it’s much safer running single file. #WhatAnIdiot.”
To keep my guy “safe” in gonna help him
aero block to keep other drivers from getting next to us.We learned today it’s much safer running single file. #WhatAnIdiot 😉😂 https://t.co/TXJ7WK0gyS
— Freddie Kraft (@FreddieKraft) April 28, 2024
As mentioned earlier, one of the drivers who spoke about the issue was Kyle Larson. He was engaged in an intense battle for the lead with Denny Hamlin for long parts of the race, but was unable to get close to him towards the end due to aero-blocking.
Blocking expert Kyle Larson unhappy after Denny Hamlin does the same
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The Hendrick Motorsports star speaking against aero-blocking was a bit weird considering that he does the same thing whenever his lead is threatened. Perhaps the #5 driver was not a fan of his own medicine. But a lot of his words did make sense. Aero-blocking has been a massive issue with the Next-Gen since the driver defending always has a huge advantage. And perhaps that’s exactly how Denny Hamlin won at Dover on Sunday.
“I knew when I got within three car lengths, he was going to start moving around. I just couldn’t really do anything. I was trying all sorts of different angles and speeds and all that. Nothing could generate enough speed to get close enough to do anything,” the former Cup Series champion said as per Yardbarker. “Good points day, but we would have loved to get a win. Always fast here at Dover and we need to be a little better on the restarts,” he further added.
Air blocking was, once again, a topic after the race on pit road. Kyle Larson suggests NASCAR should get rid of the rear view cameras to at least make it a little harder to air-block people. He used the word "easy" several times in describing the air-blocking technique.
— Jeff Gluck (@jeff_gluck) April 28, 2024
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There may be a lot of criticism of the practice, but it’s not going to get solved this season, it certainly doesn’t look like it. So what can NASCAR do to make sure that it gets tougher for racers to block? Let us know what you think.