Welcome to Warped Wednesday. On this, we'll put out the rush to judgment mat, go a little too far and have a little fun. Will it be funny? Sometimes. Will it be crazy and largely unbelievable? Probably. Will not everyone get it? Definitely. THIS IS SATIRE.
Eddie Gossage has no shortage of ideas to get his track attention and after watching Saturday night's IndyCar Series race at Texas Motor Speedway, he could have had his craziest one yet.
Sources exclusive to Warped Wednesday said that when Gossage saw the speeds of the IndyCars fall off dramatically through the course of a fuel and tire run, he started feverishly thinking about the possibility of a showdown between the open wheel cars and the Sprint Cup Series cars.
Yes, the IndyCars are the fastest oval-track cars in the world, but at the end of the fuel and tire cycles, the field was averaging approximately 198 MPH a lap. Or, in NASCAR terms, just two MPH faster than the Sprint Cup Series pole speed at Texas Motor Speedway in April.
The premise of the race would go like this. It'd be a 25 lap, winner take all shootout between 10 Cup cars and 10 IndyCars. The Cup cars would be given fresh tires and just enough fuel to make it to the finish while the IndyCars would be handicapped with a full fuel load and tires with 50 laps on them. Each car would run one qualifying lap on the same fuel and tire setup before the race.
Would it be a competitive race? Who knows. But don't we all want to find out? NASCAR has never had the opportunity to challenge the IndyCar Series for speed at a given track, but given the speeds of the Gen-6 cars (you've undoubtedly heard the shouts about track records being broken more often than not), it's an opportunity the sanctioning body may not want to pass up. After all, it'd be a chance for NASCAR to prove itself as king, right?
Plus, Texas is the perfect venue for the race given Gossage's promotional history. If the race is greenlighted by both sanctioning bodies (Warped Wednesday sources say it's being strongly considered), can't you just see Gossage and company creating the billboards pitting Danica Patrick against her old IndyCar mates?
Enrique Bernoldi Enrico Bertaggia Tony Bettenhausen Mike Beuttler
