Aren't late model roofs supposed to be "flat" still....

[Morgs153]

Recently I've been seeing Mark Martin appear on a bunch of podcasts and places and he is strongly voicing his opinions on what he sees as big culprit of not so great racing in NASCAR. The one thing I hear him consistently harp about is - they need to get rid of down force. They need to especially get back to the days of when they had something like a neutral front down force like back in the late 80s early 90s . Too much front down force is making it harder to pass and taking too much driving out of the driver's hands and it is stinking up the show, especially with the newest version of cars they have.

Boy, doesn't that sound familiar? Too hard to pass, especially when you lose the front down force.

Not saying I'd want to see dirt supers look anything like Cup cars. No, not at all. Just saying there is something in the concept that a really good former driver recognizes and many of us have also been recognizing.

[Fast Wheels]

The 1984 NDRA small body that saved super late model racing when it was on the sharp decline had a 35” deck height that did not lift and a 72 inch with across the entire car plus the cars were symmetrical. No elephant ear concave nosepieces. These cars need to go back to that.

[lurker]

The

1984 NDRA small body that saved super late model racing when it was on the sharp decline had a 35” deck height that did not lift and a 72 inch with across the entire car plus the cars were symmetrical. No elephant ear concave nosepieces. These cars need to go back to that.

I was just getting ready to mention that and UMP.


This is from 1985 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kVr7TFtj4xw


Fun’n here a little bit, but I’d rather the cars look like this - https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=1388948393448975&set=a.377411324602692

[kidrock]

I would be interest in seeing what would happen if they would take downforce away. Would the racing actually get better? The worst thing to happen to Nascar is when the engineers got involved. The same is happening to dirt late models.

[chathamracefan]

The snowplow noses on the front look hideous also. IIRC before like the last 10 years you'd never see a guy pull off due to the nose being folded under the front wheels. Now it is a common occurrence. Hit the cushion wrong & the nose folds under (cause it is the size of a small house) and now the car is undrivable.

Another big problem in my admittedly uneducated opinion.

[over4T]

I ran with the winged and/or sideboarded Late Models in the '80s and it was about as much fun as I ever had except for the old Hardtops I started in in the late '50s. Dropped to the Super/Pro Stock type cars when the LMs died on the West Coast in the '90s and have been there since. The last few years these cars want to look like the current Lates and nearly all run LM type noses, just not quite as extreme. We're one of the few running the Camaro type noses. Our racing is all on the 1/4-3/8 tracks and Aero is not that big of a deal and we still snag some wins without it. The bent distorted National series type Lates are about the ugliest things I've ever seen. MARS and other short track regional type cars are much more attractive.