Round one is complete in the Couch Racer Track Bracket event. We had the full March experience full of upsets, blowouts, and even buzzer-beaters? (Not really.) Before we dive in, a little background. To seed the tournament we simply took each tracks highest rating from Jeff Gluck's (@jeff_gluck) "Was it a good race?" polls dating back to 2018. For tracks that didn't have poll results, we just threw them in the bottom of the bracket. So some upsets were expected, some were not and some that were expected came up short. We encouraged fans to take into consideration all elements that make a great track, including the racing product, fan atmosphere, tailgating, facilities and anything else that matters to you. So let's take a look at how things shook out.
Upsets:
For me, the most surprising upset was #11 Sonoma Raceway over #6 Charlotte Motor Speedway. I love road courses. I love watching road courses, my favorite tracks in video games were always the road courses. I enjoy watching a big clunky stock car plow around tight corners and test the drivers in elements they're not used to. That being said, Charlotte is a staple. I would've had Charlotte close to my final four. For the history, the Coke 600, the All-Star events, and the fun that always takes place around Charlotte during race weekend. Even when the race isn't the best, it's a great time.
Maybe the least surprising upset of Round 1 follows. A very underrated Dover Motor Speedway was seeded 13th against Kansas Speedway at #4. A blowout from the second it was tweeted, Kansas never stood a chance only getting 21% of the vote.
Michigan International Speedway emulated their in-state basketball friends-- the Wolverines, by winning their first match-up as an 11-seed taking down New Hampshire Motor Speedway. I think both tracks produce some great racing at times so it was a tough choice for me. But with NHMS having arguably the most unique trophy in all of sports, I had to give them my vote.
Other upsets - #10 Nashville over #7 LA Coliseum, #9 Road America over #8 Pocono, #10 Homestead-Miami over #7 Watkins Glen, and #9 North Wilksboro over #8 Atlanta.
Blowouts:
Not as much to say about these since most were expected. Our top-4 ranked tracks crushed their road-course opponents. The most lopsided of all being Martinsville Speedway getting 97.5% of the vote over Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course. Similarly Bristol Motor Speedway almost hit the 97% mark vs Canadian Tire Motorsport Park. Despite being a blow-out, maybe a strong performance from Circuit of the Americas for getting more of a vote-share than the previously mentioned road-courses combined while going against NASCAR's Goliath, Daytona International Speedway. We also had marquee venue Darlington Raceway crush Indianapolis Motor Speedway's Road Course. And last of the match-ups that received >80% we had #1 Talladega Superspeedway taking down #16 Lucas Oil Indianapolis Raceway Park.
Buzzer-beaters:
Okay, it's hard to have a buzzer-beater in a 24-hour poll. But best emulating the drama was #11 World Wide Tech Raceway vs #3 Las Vegas Motor Speedway. The days long poll had just a 49-51 margin before Las Vegas went on a heater in the closing hours. They ended up with 55.5% of the vote, the slimmest margin of the round.
Looking forward:
Round two has some great match-ups to look forward to. Heavy-hitter #1 seed Talladega has to go against historical favorite North Wilksboro. Dover's underdog dominance will be tested against the popular Charlotte Roval. And Fontana has to hold off round one upset-artist Sonoma. Voting will take place all weekend long, tune-in to Couch Racer's twitter @CouchRacerShop.
Full Round One Results:
