FERGUSON: Invite-Only the best way for Bristol

FERGUSON: Invite-Only the best way for Bristol
Dirt at Bristol is being laid down for the highly anticipated month of racing on the short track.

The World of Outlaws announced on Monday that when its top touring series head to Bristol Motor Speedway in April, the events would be invite-only.

That means, obviously, no open entries will be allowed to participate in the first sprint car race at the track since 2001. Competitors will receive invitations from their respective series’ race directors.

All World of Outlaws full-time drivers will be invited.

Now, that drew controversy from a few people on social media, as does any decision that’s made in the present time, pretty much. But I think that it’s a pretty ridiculous claim to make.

When the tour hits the track, it will be a unique type of race track that we’ll see the modern-day sprint cars run on for the first time. That could be a different animal than it was in 2001.

Cars today have made advances in technology over the years. Limits have been pushed, extended, and then pushed again. New engine developers are entering the sport.

Point being, the cars are faster.

Not only that, but there isn’t a track on either of the World of Outlaws Late Model or Sprint Car schedules that closely resembles Bristol.

Just having anyone racing out there isn’t conducive to a great return to the place.

Having an invite-only event isn’t anything that’s very new, either.

It became somewhat of a commodity for big events being ran coming out of the pandemic pause. The return to the track at Knoxville, the Governor’s Reign at Eldora, as well as a few other events through 2020 featured invitational fields, too.

Although, that was more applied for social distancing purposes, the cases have similarities.

There’s no need to plug a race track with cars that aren’t competing for the win, when the ground they are racing on is unfamiliar in the first place.

So, to the people frustrated, my advice is to cool it. The fact we get to watch a race at Bristol is a dream come true in its own right.

This will spur into another debate, I’m sure.

But the question becomes who to bring through?

Voice of the World of Outlaws Sprint Car Series Johnny Gibson elaborated his suggestions on Twitter, and also revealed that he doesn’t know what the final count of teams invited will be.

Below are his suggestions.

On the late model side of the things, the competing Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series is scheduled to race during both nights of action at Bristol, so that would take somewhere around 10-12 big names out of the running.

That shouldn’t be as big of an issue as it might have been on the sprint car side, but nonetheless leaves room for suggestions.

That’s all obviously fluid will be more of a concern once the race weekends are closer, but if we could take a step back from tearing it down before it’s standing, that would be great.