The Tire Debacle 400

I've been back and forth on the race yesterday. Angry, amused, concerned, confused (yes, that rhymed) and I'm still not totally sure where I stand on the Goodyear Tire Debacle 400.

Here are the facts:

Goodyear had a tire test at Indy in April. There were tire problems. Drivers talked about it, media wrote about it, NASCAR said everything would be fine. There was zero percent work done on those tires. NASCAR and Goodyear lived on a prayer that rubber would be put down on the track, even though that didn't happen at the test, and that everything would be fine. Not so much.

NASCAR however, did do the best they could with what they had. Is this their fault? Yes, partly. Actions should have been taken to fix the problem before hand, but since they weren't, NASCAR played the hand they were dealt and no one was hurt.

Goodyear also did all they could this weekend. They prepared themselves for the teams to run out of Indy tires by bring in Pocono tires, just in case. They also dug deep to find enough tires so that didn't have to happen. But the other half of the blame is on them. They should have fixed the problem in the first place. They, with NASCAR, put themselves in this situation.

The pit crews were rock stars. Making no less than 16 pitstops with little breaks in between in the sweltering heat at a track where no wind moves because of the infield pagoda. Rock stars, seriously.

No one was hurt, which I mentioned before but deserves to be mentioned again. NASCAR and Goodyear's blunder put drivers at risk and luckily everything turned out okay.

In the end, it was a boring race but an intense experience.