So Tired of the Left

Every time I see it, it's "left" this and "left" that. Left, left, left, left, left!

I can't help but wonder "wouldn't NASCAR be a little more interesting if they had just a few races that went right each year?" In case there are any NASCAR fans reading this, I'm aware of the road courses that require both left and right turns but I'm questioning the oval races. I'm not a NASCAR fan in the least but if they had one race that was clockwise, I'd probably actually watch some of it just because it's different -- like inter-league play in Major League Baseball. Who knows, maybe in the few laps that I would watch I'd become hooked. It doesn't seem likely for me personally but they have to get their foot in the door somehow.

With the Indy 500 being run tomorrow (yes, I know that isn't NASCAR) it got me wondering why auto racing, and nearly all racing in the United States, is run counterclockwise. So I scoured the Internet for at least 15 minutes to find an answer.  Don't worry, it wasn't more than 20 minutes. Here are the more believable answers I found:

Why are NASCAR races run counterclockwise in the first place? Because at its inception NASCAR adopted horse racing's precedent.

OK, easy enough but I dug a wee bit deeper.

Why were horse races run counterclockwise? They weren't. Well, not outside of the U.S. Counterclockwise racing was introduced by American Revolution supporter William Whitley in 1780. The British had established clockwise horse racing so, of course, to be contrary Whitley began running horse races counterclockwise. Sounds plausible to me (see "Freedom Fries" circa 2002). The idea caught on and eventually stuck for the horses and was naturally held over for auto racing.

And the original question: Why not try the right?  The best answer I could find deals with driver safety. In American cars the driver side is on the left. So if they were to drive the track clockwise, the driver would be on the side of the car nearer the wall which leaves less car to crumple during an accident. Of course, that just means that currently they are driving with other cars on their left side instead of the wall! Which is more dangerous? I'm afraid that would take more than five minutes of Internet searching to find out so consider that question as reader homework. Although, I may spend five minutes composing an e-mail to see if I can get NASCAR's official response to racing clockwise. I'll be sure to update all of you who will be waiting with bated breath.

Just Joe


NEXT WEEK: Art Imitating Life?