NASCAR mailbag: Important questions answered before the Daytona 500 – FOXSports.com

Do you like or dislike the new format changes and the damaged car policy? – Judy

Well, there’s a lot that goes into that. First off, I do like the stages. Short tracks all over the country run heat races. I think it’s going to add a lot of excitement to the first half of the races, which is needed. 

As far as the points go, I want to see how it actually works in the real world. I think it will be fine, but I want to see how it plays out. Before, NASCAR didn’t do nearly enough to reward the regular-season champion. Now, it could be just the opposite, with too much weight in terms of bonus points on the regular season. We’ll see. I admit I’m curious.

As I have said before, the damaged-car policy is great. There is no reason whatsoever to put a damaged race car back on track so a driver can finish 36^th instead of 39^th. None. IMHO, they should have done this years ago.

, LAT Images www.latphoto.co.uk John K Harrelson