NASCAR Cup Series: Qualifying needs literally any change, and right now

There are dozens upon dozens of possible solutions to NASCAR’s qualifying issue. But the Cup Series got stuck with the seemingly inevitable problem.

The fact that Hendrick Motorsports teammates Alex Bowman and Chase Elliott failed to get to the start/finish line to start their qualifying lap in the third and final qualifying session for the third race of the 2019 NASCAR Cup Series season, the Pennzoil 400 presented by Jiffy Lube, at Las Vegas Motor Speedway just over two weeks ago was a sign of things to come.

And while 10 of the 12 drivers who advanced to that qualifying session did, in fact, make it to the start/finish line on time to record one timed lap, the fact that this was a sign of things to come was inevitable as soon as it happened, especially since Bowman and Elliott would have qualified for the race in first and second place, respectively, had they done so.

For the season’s fifth race, the Auto Club 400, at Auto Club Speedway, a grand total of zero of the 12 drivers who advanced to the third and final qualifying session on Friday evening recorded a lap in that session. When this became a reality, it seemed a bit surreal, but at the same time, it was not surprising.

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With the new aero package for the 2019 season, cars are at an advantage from a speed perspective when running behind a group as opposed to in front of a group. As a result, nobody wants to be the first car on the track during qualifying.

So when the 12 drivers who advanced to the third and final qualifying session for the Auto Club 400 left the pits, they effectively did so all at once and in one big pack. But when they did, given the fact that there was not much time left on the clock, it was clear that none of these 12 drivers were even going to take the green flag for their qualifying runs. Not shockingly, by the time the checkered flag flew, nobody even came relatively close to doing so.

Richard Childress Racing’s Austin Dillon, whose top lap time of 39.982 seconds (180.081 miles per hour) in the second of three qualifying sessions for the 200-lap race around the four-turn, 2.0-mile (3.219-kilometer) Auto Club Speedway oval in Fontana, California was the fastest, ended up taking the pole position for the race as a result of this lap time, but he officially took the pole position with a lightning-fast lap of 0.000 seconds.

You can almost hear Tom Carnegie saying “It’s a new track record!”, can you not?

Let’s hope that this “new track record” stays the “new track record” not only for Auto Club Speedway but for every track in every series across the world and that this joke of a qualifying session never, ever happens again in any way, shape or form.

It was nothing short of an embarrassment and an utter disgrace. The only better word for it is fraud — and that’s if you’re feeling extremely generous.

There are several possible changes that could be implemented to combat this issue. But despite all of these possible solutions, NASCAR still ended up stuck with the seemingly inevitable problem, meaning that changes need to happen and they need to happen now, or what happened in Friday’s qualifying session will happen again on multiple occasions before the 2019 season ends, and the season isn’t scheduled to end for more than eight months.

Single-car qualifying would be the easiest solution. Reducing the time limits in the group qualifying sessions could be another solution since it would prompt drivers to get out on the track to record a lap or laps much quicker as opposed to sitting in the pits for several minutes doing absolutely nothing but waiting for the clock to wind down — and, as we saw on Friday evening, sometimes waiting a bit too long.

Penalizing drivers who do not complete at least one lap in qualifying sessions to which they advance might also work. Lining drivers up in the reverse finishing order from the previous session and sending the drivers in that pack out to do one timed lap only could also be a viable option, and it wouldn’t even require a timer to execute.

I could go on and on and on with viable and simple solutions to this totally unnecessary issue. None of these solutions require reinventing the wheel to attain. They are simple tweaks that NASCAR could literally make in the time it takes the average person to finish reading this sentence.

Now they just need to make them — the key word being “now”.

On a positive note, changes are, in fact, supposedly on their way after this disastrous “non-qualifying” session, and they truly cannot come soon enough.

Here is what NASCAR senior vice president of competition Scott Miller had to say about the matter, according to NBC Sports.

"“I saw obviously what our fans don’t want, obviously, having the last 12 cars wait until they couldn’t get a time posted on the board and kind of making a mockery out of the qualifying is not what we expect for our fans. It’s a little bit on us that we hoped things would go better than that. It’s an exciting show when they’re out there on the race track but obviously we have a little work to do on our part to get a little bit better format so things like that can’t happen. We certainly want to provide our fans with what they deserve and we and the teams didn’t do a very good job of that today, so we’re really disappointed.“I think we will definitely make some tweaks to [group qualifying], not quite sure what…We really don’t want to go back to single-car qualifying. There may not be another way. We want to exhaust every possibility before we do that because that’s not as fun, not as intriguing of a show as the group situation.”"

Here is what Stewart-Haas Racing’s Clint Bowyer, who was one of the 12 drivers in the third and final qualifying session for the race, had to say about the matter, according to NBC Sports.

"“We just got booed. It’s disappointing. It’s disappointing for everybody involved. I don’t know. I saw this coming three weeks ago. I think we all did. Unfortunately, we’re going to have to be reactive to it instead of proactive. We’ll get through. It’s just a learning process. The whole package is a learning process. Everybody knows that going in. Everybody has been patient with it. I’m a little bit out of patience with Fridays.”"

Joe Gibbs Racing’s Kyle Busch, another one of these 12 drivers, had this to add about the matter, according to NBC Sports.

"“Don’t hate the player. Hate the game.”"

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What can NASCAR do to prevent another qualifying session like the one we saw on Friday evening for this Sunday’s Auto Club 400 at Auto Club Speedway? Will they implement some kind of change or changes in the near future? We can only hope so for the sake of the sport itself, its drivers and its fanbase, as Friday evening’s qualifying session was nothing short of a complete disaster.

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