The Pit Stall

We’ve put together the default driver groups and salaries for the upcoming 2012 NASCAR season. The following are what we are using for Salary Cap leagues here on Nascar Pools Online. There may be some additions over the next week or two as more announcements are made.

We have brought the salaries down again this year to help put together more competitive teams.  The uncertain economic times and reduced sponsorship available for the fringe teams had made it quite difficult to select a decent team under the previous salary scale.

Driver Salaries

We’ve added a number of drivers expected to run part time schedules on the site as well.  Most are listed for $25.

Filed under: Site by Site Admin - Thursday, January 26th, 2012
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The 2012 season is only a month away, and we’ve put together our groups and boxes for the upcoming season. Similar to last year, it has been tough figuring out the last few groups as there are still a number of rides up in the air. We wont be posting the box groups by car, but they’ll follow these quite closely. The salaries for this season will also be posted shortly.

If you’re doing a box style league for this season, we think you should consider doing the Standard Points option, dropping your lowest driver for each race.

Box Style Leagues

Pick’em Style Leagues

The final group in this one will be a selection of 20 – 24 of the remaining drivers, including the rest of the full-time teams, some part timers, and a few road course specialists.

Filed under: Site by Site Admin - Thursday, January 26th, 2012
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Now that the anticipation and excitement of Daytona is over, and most leagues are all set up, we figured now would be a good time to take a look at where the site is now, compared to the last couple seasons. 

The site has grown a great deal from the first version in 2008.  Back then, there was pretty much only one league set-up, with a single league ID and an admin password and a poolie password, so everyone logged in the same way.  There were no personal online selections, no message boards and only 3 scoring methods.  That season, we had 7 leagues, with about 250 total teams.

In 2009, we made serious changes to the site, adding personal accounts, several default pool set-ups, and created 2 or 3 other custom set-ups, along with another handful of scoring options.  With the personal accounts came the ability for online selections, the message boards, and one login to access all of your leagues (for those that are in multiple leagues on the site). 

2010 saw a re-branding of the site, a couple more options for pools, and a few more scoring options, including the ability to drop a score each week.  We also added a number of different stat displays for leagues, and made some changes to the admin side, to allow us to update a single league when necessary, instead of requiring a full site update every time a change is made.

This year, we’ve had to revamp the main scoring methods, as NASCAR updated their points structure.  Along with that we’ve had to update a number of stats/standings pages, and there’s now a standings page showing all team selections for non-pickem style leagues.  On top of that, we’ve added a couple more custom scoring options.  We’ve also modified all of the site emails to send both a plain text and html version.  We’re still working towards making the payment process as automated as possible, and we’re hoping some changes coming from PayPal will make this possible.  A couple ‘user manuals’ are already in the works, one for league commissioners, and one for poolies. 

Statistically, we’ve seen solid growth in our numbers season to season, but the most exciting part is seeing the growth of some of the leagues that have been with us since those first couple seasons.  Here’s a breakdown of some of the growth we’ve seen. The 2011 stats are at the time of posting and may change in the next week or two.

In the 4 seasons we’ve been online, we’ve grown considerably, and with that there have been some growing pains.  We thank you for being patient with us, when we haven’t been able to implement change as fast as we would have liked.  We hope we’ve made the lives of those that run NASCAR pools a little easier, and look forward to doing so in the future. We’re always trying to improve the service we provide, and it’s often through your comments and feedback that features are added or improved.  Feel free to post a comment, or use the contact form to send us a message if you have any suggestions.

Filed under: Site by Site Admin - Thursday, February 24th, 2011
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We’ve started putting together the default driver groups and salaries for the upcoming season. The following are what we have so far. There may be some additions over the next week or so as announcements are made.

Driver Salaries

If there is someone running at least a part time schedule that you think should be added, send us a message.

Filed under: Site by Site Admin - Sunday, January 16th, 2011
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We’ve put together our groups and boxes for the upcoming season. It has been alot more difficult this season, as there are still a good number of teams with alot of details up in the air. We wont be posting the box groups by car, but they’ll follow these quite closely. The salaries will also be posted shortly.

Box Style Leagues

Pick’em Style Leagues

The final group in this one will be a selection of 20 – 24 of the remaining drivers, including the rest of the full-time teams, some part timers, and a few road course specialists.

Filed under: Site by Site Admin - Sunday, January 16th, 2011
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We get several emails over the course of the pre-season asking if we can handle all sorts of different Nascar pools.  Here’s a general outline of what we currently offer:

1. Salary Cap

Each team is given $1000 to pick exactly 8 drivers for the season.  You can select any 8 drivers as long as you keep your total salary for your team at or under $1000.  Trades are an option.  Picking teams online is also an option.  Number of drivers and salaries are not customizable.

2. Pick’em

There are 5 groups of drivers, grouped by previous performance.  Select one driver from each group for each race.  If you select a driver for the 6th race, he will be added to all of the following races as well.  Selections can be modified up until the weekly deadline which is generally 12pm (Noon) Eastern on the day of qualifying.  Daytona 500 and scheduled qualifying sessions beginning before this time, will be an exception.  Number of drivers and the groups are not customizable.  Picking online is an option.

3. Pick’em – All

Similar to the  Pick’em Style, but there are no groups.  Select the pre-determined number of drivers for each race out of all available drivers, prior to the weekly deadline.  Number of drivers is customizable.  Picking online is an option.

4. Pick One

Also similar to the Pick’em Style, but you only select one driver for each race, prior to the deadline.  Several leagues using this option also have limits on when and how many times a driver can be selected.  The site doesn’t have these limits set, but commissioners can modify ‘illegal’ picks (according to their rules) if need be.  Picking online is an option.

5. Box

There are 8 groups set up prior to the season.  Pick one car or driver from each of the groups.  Groups are not customizable.  Picks can be made online.  Trades are also an option.

6. Custom

There are basically two sides to ‘Custom’ leagues.  One is you use a set up similar to one of the non-pick’em styles above, but would prefer to customize your own groups or salaries.  All of the cars/drivers are listed, and the commissioner handles the submission of all of the teams.  The number of cars/drivers per team is customizable.  Trades are still allowed, but must be processed by the commissioner.  Picking teams online isn’t an option, as all teams have to be submitted by the commissioner.

The other ‘custom’ option is you let us know how your pool works, and we can work on setting something up for you.  We don’t gaurantee we can set up any type of pool, but if it’s different than anything else we have, we’ll consider it.  We set up a number of custom pool types last year, and have a couple more in the works for this year.  Maybe we’ll add descriptions of some of them, and make them available for selection.

You can also check out our various scoring options.

Filed under: Nascar Pool Help, Site by Site Admin - Wednesday, January 27th, 2010
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We have several scoring methods set up as default options, and we also have a number of custom methods. Here’s an outline all of the different options that are currently available.  New methods will be added once they’ve been used for a full season.

1. Standard Points

Uses the Nascar Championship points scoring system.  Can choose whether or not to count penalties.  Highest score wins.  Only points earned for racing are included.  The Chase reset does not get added for your drivers.

2. Standard Points – Drop Lowest

Uses the Standard Points method, and the lowest score for that race is dropped.  Can choose whether or not to count penalties.  If counting penalties, the lowest score after the penalty is applied is dropped.  Highest score wins.

3. Standard Points – Modified

Uses the Standard Points method for all cars/drivers making the field, and awards 29 points to all cars/drivers that do not.  Highest score wins.

4. Finish

Your points for the race include the finishing position of the car/driver.  If your car/driver finishes 1st, you get one point, and if they finish 30th, 30 points, etc.  If your car/driver doesn’t make the field for whatever reason, they get 75 points.  There are 2 bonuses awarded, one for the pole if qualifying is contested (-10 pts) and one for the most laps led in the race (-5 pts).  Lowest score wins.

5. Top 10

Points are only awarded to the top 10 finishers of the race.  If your car/driver finishes 1st, you get 10 points, 2nd, 9 pts and so on down to 10th place which receives 1 point.  All others are awarded no points.  Highest score wins.

6. Redline (Custom)

The Redline scoring method is a variation on the Finish method.  Points are still awarded by the finish position, but a laps led bonus is -1 point, with winning the pole (whether quals are contested or not) also being worth -1 point.  The race winning car/driver is also awarded a -2 point bonus.  All cars/drivers not participating in the race for whatever reason receive 44 points.  There is a Chase reset in this method and should really only be used for the Redline pool since the reset it limited to a specific number of teams.  Lowest score wins. 

7. Capper (Custom)

The Capper scoring method is a variation on the Top 10 method.  Instead of the top 10 receiving points, it is now the top 15, from 15 points for first, down to 1 point for 15th.  Winning the pole is also a 5 point bonus.  Highest score wins.

8. Riverton (Custom)

The Riverton scoring method is similar to the Top 10 method, except points are awarded to all cars/drivers in a race.  The first place car/driver gets 45 points, 2nd place, 44 points and so on, down to 3 points for 43rd.  There is a 5 point bonus for leading the most laps, as well as a 5 point bonus for winning a pole (if qualifying is contested – except the Daytona 500).  Highest score wins.

If you have a scoring method you want to use for your league, send us a message, and we’ll try to incorporate it.  We started with only the 3 basic methods (Standard, Finish & Top 10) and have worked with other leagues to make their method work as well.

Filed under: Nascar Pool Help, Site by Site Admin - Wednesday, January 27th, 2010
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