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Silver Series: Physics-Defying Top 10 Baffles Strategists

The top 10 finishers on Friday at Homestead seemed like a normal set of top 10 finishers for the Season 40 Silver Series. The dominant series leader JJ Davis and his rival Dimitri Pironi both found the podium, and all but one of the top 10 finishers is ranked in the top 10 in points.

The problem wasn't who was there, it was how they got there. 3rd place finisher, JJ Davis was carrying an astonishing 51% damage across the line. His lap times at the end of the race were a full second+ slower than the first half of the race, but for some reason no one could pass him.

But wait, there's more. 4th place finisher Thorsten Trips carried 47% damage across the line. With all that damage his machine only lost around a half-second per lap until he caught JJ Davis with 3 to go. Despite being a full second quicker up to that point it was still not possible for the veteran to pass the wounded #46 machine piloted by Davis.

Two isn't enough? The 8th place #28 machine driven by Benjamin Jackson dragged itself across the line with 69% damage, after repairing an additional 28% earlier in the race.

Wait, there's still more. The #35 9th place finisher crossed the line with 49% damage. 10th place Pavel Enge carried a meager 22% damage over the line, so obviously he belonged in the top 10.

What does all this mean? It means damage means nothing in the NASC Silver Series. It means that even if your machine is trashed to oblivion, if your racing line skills are high enough, even a 1+ second faster machine won't pass you. It means that drivers who run clean races lose more time trying to pass broken cars, than they do from their own mistakes in spite of how much passing room there is for a stock car on a 1.5-mile oval.

It means NASC needs to be reviewed by the developers of the game.