Q: Do you think NASCAR will ever add a dirt-track race to its Nextel Cup schedule?
— Gregg Engle, Durant, Okla.

A: I would love to see that, but the answer to your question is NASCAR will never make such a move.

After North Carolina Motor Speedway at Rockingham lost its Cup races, there was an idea floated that since that track seats 60,000 and it's a one-mile layout the asphalt could be taken up and replaced with dirt.

This isn't going to happen as a sanctioned event on the Nextel Cup schedule for several reasons so the only possible scenario is for the owners of North Carolina Motor Speedway at Rockingham to change over to dirt, stage a race outside the Cup season -- maybe in December -- put up say a $3 million purse and see which Cup drivers would show up to race on dirt.

I've raced on a one-mile dirt track, and it was a lot of fun. It would be real interesting to see how good some of the current Cup drivers would be on dirt, and also how awkward some of them would look racing on the surface.

I think drivers like Tony Stewart, Ken Schrader, Kasey Kahne, Jeff Gordon, and Ryan Newman -- guys who grew up driving open-wheel midget and sprint cars on dirt -- would probably be really good in a Cup race on dirt.

Q: I am still at a loss as to why NASCAR does not allow tire warmers. It's so obvious that cold sticker tires cause a lot of problems when cars are trying to return to racing speed.
— Mike, Glendale, Ariz.

A: The reason tire warmers aren't permitted is because of the cost involved to the teams.

At some tracks, Cup teams will have up to 10 or 12 sets of tires mounted and ready to go on their car. So say a team had 10 sets of tires -- that's 40 tire warmers it would need. And with over 40 cars in a race, that's more than 1,600 tire warmers that would have to be on hand.

Figuring that the tire warmers cost approximately $100 each, that's a cost of over $160,000.

So while the use of tire warmers may lessen the difficulty of getting the cars back up to racing speed, there is the cost factor to be considered.

Without tire warmers it's also interesting in that drivers and teams try to make adjustments that will help their cars deal with cold sticker tires, and that's part of the challenge of winning races.

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