Qualifying has been a hot topic so far in the 2019 Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series season.
There have been numerous issues in group qualifying sessions, but the most notable embarrassments of the format were in Fontana, when no car recorded an official lap time in the final round and in Texas when cars were blocked on pit road from returning to the track.
Now, Scott Miller, NASCAR’s Senior Vice-President of Competition has sent out a memo letting teams know that for Richmond all of the rounds of qualifying will be five minutes each.
Before this change, the format consisted of a 10 minute long round one, a 10 minute long round two followed by a five minute long round three. Will this make any difference in the weird pit road cat and mouse games we have been seeing? We’ll find out this weekend.
