They say the key to solving a problem is first acknowledging there is a problem.
NASCAR Chairman Brian France acknowledged during the 26th annual Sprint Cup Media Tour that the 60-year-old sanctioning body has a problem. Solving it may not be easy, but diagnosing it is a good first step.
“What I hope you’ll take out of today is we’re getting back to the basics, we’re going to try to minimize the change going forward as best we can and focus on what we’ve always focused on, which is the best product in the world,” France said.
For most of the rest of the week, getting back to basics was a topic of discussion, and Lowe’s Motor Speedway President Humpy Wheeler is one who believes it is past time to make that step.

“Maybe nobody else has said it this week, but ticket sales are flat or down and television ratings are down. We need to make this car of today work so we can get back to the kind of racing where we’re putting those black doughnuts on the doors and not making a felony out of it.” — Lowe's Motor Speedway President H.A. "Humpy" Wheeler

“Maybe nobody else has said it this week, but ticket sales are flat or down and television ratings are down,” Wheeler said. “We need to make this car of today work so we can get back to the kind of racing where we’re putting those black doughnuts on the doors and not making a felony out of it.”Wheeler believes France’s admission will be the turning point that will bring another growth curve to NASCAR racing.
“I think that’s a turning point,” Wheeler said. “I am glad that was admitted and that we are talking about it.”
Readers of the Public Forum section in this newspaper are clearly aware that many of NASCAR’s original and oldest fans have become disenchanted with the direction of the sanctioning body. They aren’t the only ones.
“I kind of felt that NASCAR has gotten away from the grassroots fan,” said 1988 Cup champion Bill Elliott. “There are a lot of grassroots fans that have gotten off in other directions for whatever reason, and I think that they need to get back on that. I think losing some of the race tracks they’ve lost in this area hasn’t helped that. We go to California and it’s hard to get the fan base that we have in the East and Southeast especially and for whatever reason, I have no idea, but, still, we need to get back and try to get that grassroots fan back to the race track however we can. I totally agree with them.”  
Rusty Wallace, who won the Cup title a year after Elliott, says NASCAR lost focus after the death of Dale Earnhardt in 2001. “When we lost Dale, Sr., the sport changed and we went after the new fan and forgot about the old fan,” Wallace said. “That was a mistake.”
France also admitted the sanctioning body will give its personalities — its drivers — a little more room to maneuver and not slap fines on them every time they breathe out of the wrong nostril.
“We’re making sure that our policies of enforcement don’t make it where our drivers can’t express themselves,” France said.
One of many who are glad to hear NASCAR is getting back to its roots and lightening up on its drivers is four-time Cup champion Jeff Gordon.
“It is a tough balance,” Gordon explained. “I’m very passionate about the sport. I think about what can we do to be better, what can we do to put better racing on the track. I think of the cars. I think of track configurations. I think of the best quality of drivers and I look at the entertainment aspect of the sport.
“I look at personalities, not just the drivers but the crew chiefs and anybody that has any sort of character. Character is important. We shouldn’t all say the same things and look the same. The fans all want to find somebody. It’s not trying to be somebody you are not.
“I use Kurt Busch as an example and Tony (Stewart),” Gordon continued. “Here are guys that said some things that maybe got them into trouble, but they were highly entertaining. It gave the media a lot to write about and show on TV, and then those guys were like ‘Whoa, whoa, whoa, I can’t do that anymore because I got criticized.’ But what they didn’t realize was that while a handful of people were criticizing them, five times that many said, ‘I like that guy for what he said.’”
And that’s why a lot of people liked Dale Earnhardt and Darrell Waltrip. And that’s why a lot of people like NASCAR.