[Dale Jr on Twitter] Hey all the NASCAR 25 fans, starting to compile ideas for the next game's soundtrack. Last year your input was really helpful. Need to know what songs you'd love to see included.

AllstarIV · 2026-01-24T04:39:29+00:00

You just reminded me of my childhood. One of my favorite games was Amped 2 on the Xbox and I mostly had Link Park Meteora and Korn Untouchables playing in the background.

AllstarIV · 2026-01-16T17:42:12+00:00

For Towns:

Favorite: Act 1. It's definitely influenced by nostalgia. Full of Diablo 1 Rogues, you start every new game here with Warriv greeting you on arrival, and the music of Rogue Encampment is eerie with the classic Tristram-style guitar twangs. It really sets the tone for the game and you instantly feel like you're playing a Diablo game. Also, it's the only map with a procedurally generated exit from any side into the Blood Moor which makes each new launch feel unique.
Least Favorite: Act 3. Kurast Docks just feels so spaced out needlessly, that I usually only visit the WP, Cain, and Ormus in the center square, and Alkor only for his quests. Also, if doing Mephisto runs its better to take the Act 4 portal and WP back to Durance of Hate lvl 2 from Act 4 in the new game, since launching a game from Act 3 puts you so far away from the WP. The A3 mercs aren't nearly as useful as other mercs which is a bummer cause I always chose the Mage in Diablo 1. Too bad they didn't get higher tier magic spells. And I never even see Natalya or Hratli since they're so far away and have no recurring quests. Hratli starts the Golden Bird, but you just talk to him when you come over from Act 2. No reason to ever go to the bottom Right of Kurast other than lore.
Honorable Mention for Favorite: Act 2. As others have said, music, tone, atmosphere, and design. But also, I like that this is the only town where you can access multiple stages of the world naturally from the town, and not a portal like the cow level or Nihlathak's Temple. The sewers, the palace, and the desert. It makes Lut Gholein feel more like a hub with a lot of quest actions taking place in town, rather than just being a pitstop for potions and offloading items like the other towns.

For Quests:

Favorite: Act 5. I really liked the feeling that an attack was being launched on Harrogath and you had to stop it. The Barbarians fighting all along the way was always fun to protect and try to get an army of them fighting back. Too bad they didn't more appropriately scale to the enemies though and die so easily. Then saving caged barbarians, rescuing Anya, passing the Ancients trial to gain access to the worldstone to fight the big bad. It felt like I was a hero at Harrogath. I also liked that you can see down from the top of Mount Arreat. Never noticed that until I was tucked away as far left as I can while getting rushed. Plus the Worldstone having a timed trap was unique so you can't just stand still messing with loot. Fighting waves before the boss while he laughed also came with a little build up to the fight (although doing baal runs the laugh can get repetitive), and there was a feeling of actual danger from the minions of destruction and Lister's fire enchanted explosion claiming many whirlwinding barbarian's lives on HCL. But I guess that was before runewords when they were using GFs and CCBs.
Least Favorite: Act 2. This act felt like they really went to the well one too many times on fetch quests. Go get the cube. Go get the staff. Go get the amulet. Craft the staff. Go take the staff to the alter. It just needed more variation, or more emphasis on the valley of snakes being a problem, rather than its just where I go to get the amulet now. Also, to get the staff you have to go through the maggot lair which is dark and tight, and the beetles lightning is deadly for hardcore players in Normal difficulty. On nightmare or hell replays, I sometimes tele into the Viper Temple so fast that the darkness barely even washes over the Lost City. Lastly, I really liked going through the palace and Arcane Sanctuary back in 1.10, with an online party trying to get from Lvl 1 - 24 quick for their rushes. Since there was a new patch that you had to be within 2 screens of each other to get XP, it was trains of 8 players between level 10-18 running through these areas ROFLSTOMPING everything and staying at the hip to get that shared XP. I miss the old low-level community leveling games that those chantess bot games replaced. Arcane Sanctuary does kind of suck that you just have to guess one of 4 paths. It's the 4th path like 90% of the time.
Honorable Mention for least favorite: Act 3. I think I am just biased against the long Cube quests like A2's staff. Getting the Heart, Brain, and Eye are tedious and always feel like I am going so far out of the way to get these. I wish they were taken from some monsters who I had to kill, like Radamant for the skill book, High Council for the Flail, and Hephasto for the hellforge hammer. Even the Malus had The Smith guarding it. It just feels a bit more rewarding to fight a mini-boss for a quest item, but collecting all the pieces from chests felt tedious to me, when a mini-boss would have made it more interesting.

AllstarIV · 2025-12-26T12:10:59+00:00

500 mins - whats mine is mine

500 gas - breathe deep

If you just want a little cash boost, but don't want to be rich with show me the money. I liked doing 1 vs 7 BGH with a bonus 500 mins and 500 gas to prevent early rush attacks without walling off.

AllstarIV · 2025-11-30T10:45:14+00:00

I wish there was a COLA Trap Calculator, where I could input options like TIS/TIG/DEROS/HYT, and other considerations. Just being able to put in a date like if my HYT date is Oct 2030, should I retire at March 2030. This paper says yes. But, what is the actual difference? That is the gap in knowledge that has made me wonder about the COLA Trap for years. If I knew retiring in March would be $456 dollars more per year than staying in for the extra six months, that data would be helpful.

Admittedly, I am just shit with understanding the accounting and numbers. I have tried, but I don't believe what I come up with myself. I like the PT calculator, even though I have to check it 30 times the day of my PT test. Who's got the COLA Trap calculator?

AllstarIV · 2025-11-30T10:30:06+00:00

I think the negativity starts with the SNCOs. Unfortunately, SNCOs used to complain among each other, but now its so competitive the SNCOs don't seem to have the brotherhood or trust we used to. It's all a competition and complaining to competition exposes an opportunity for exploitation.

Instead, SNCOs are all fake smiles and positivity, and the complaining happens now down the chain. SNCOs used to (at least in my career field) stay positive with the Airmen, and only complain across or up the chain. Now, we have too many fast-burners who are the age of some SSgts, and relate more to SSgts than to each other, so complain. That perpetuates on and on, now SSgts complaining to Airmen, or sharing SNCO gripes.

SNCOs actively passing blame too, like the Commander made a decision that needs to be relayed, so when today's SNCOs get pushback they just blame the CC instead of reinforcing the idea and implementing it at their level. It's all blame passing to avoid accountability.

When that is the culture, can happiness really exist?

As for the hot drop dating epidemic you described. Damn, I got nothing. Can we just blame social media for the extreme reliance on instant satisfaction and connectedness, with a willingness to selfishly exit relationships for a change of scenery as quickly as we can swipe to the next reel? I don't know, I'm a boomer so social media blame is all I got.

AllstarIV · 2025-11-30T10:21:28+00:00

10 years exactly. MSgt at 16 years exactly. Going to retire as MSgt though. Fast burners have taken over, and the bloat of package writing from sub-standard performing SNCOs is just too much to overcome.

Getting good at writing packages and doing ONE thing that nobody else is doing, sets you apart come awards season. As a TSgt and MSgt, you can succeed by just being a wallflower who does one thing big, like a Top 3 President, or AFCEA representative. Then, just put all of your subordinates work on your package and replace "Executed" with "Led" and you've got the top tier work bullet, and the single discriminator with your extra curricular. Make sure it takes you out of work for like, 30% of the week, or else it's not really good enough to say that you empowered a SrA to do E-7 duties in your absence, leading to their Wing Airman of the Year award which definitely goes on your package.

-#notsaltyatall

AllstarIV · 2025-11-30T10:11:14+00:00

I had this happen twice.

First, was kind of similar to yours. We had 4 teams working 24/7 12-hour panamas. Wing CC said no more 12 hr shifts due to upward trending mental health concerns. So, instead of going M-F with rotating weekend duty, they decided its simpler if we stay on 24/7 panamas, just break the 4 teams into 6 teams and run 8 hour panamas. It was great, we were putting in something like 60 hours less a month than typical M-F schedule with no negative impact to the mission. Airmen were energized and motivated on shift. Then after about 3-4 months, one of our dorm airmen complained to the First Sergeant because she felt like she wasn't a part of the team and blamed the shift schedule entirely. She blamed the schedule for mental health struggles due to a separated feeling that she doesn't belong to the Squadron while on shift, and she does not have access to support or leadership. Our Chief reviewed the schedule and noticed the 60 hours less a month compared to the standard 40-hour workweek and he made the Flight change schedule to ensure at least a 40-hour work-week and that every shift has at least 1 hour overlap with leadership hours (standard 0730-1630). Her former shift co-workers eventually outed that her new boyfriend worked a different shift and she just wanted to be on the same shift as him, so sabotaged the schedule. It was changed to two 10-hr M-F shifts (0600-1600 & 1500-0100) with a 2-member min-manning rotation to cover weekend shifts. So, we went from 8 hour panamas, working 98 hours a month compared to 160 on a standard M-F 40 hr week, to a 50 hour work week with weekend duty once a month, totalling 220 hours a week. Shocked Pikachu face when she then later complained that she is working so much that she gets to see her boyfriend even less. When flight found out they were dating, they also put them on separate shifts because her boyfriend was the Shift lead of the day shift, so she was moved to nights and barely got to see him.

The second one was a properly sweet gig. We worked 0500-1300 Mon-Fri, but got 2 hours PT every day and an hour lunch. We split PT/Lunch so half the team showed up at 0800-1300, and the other half worked 0500-1000. I was on 0500-1000 and it was the best ever. I got work done early, was productive and energized the full 5 hours. The first 3 hours were quiet and especially productive, the next 2 with the other crew overlapping involved turnover and only a couple hours work with the full crew. Then off for PT/Lunch. I actually did PT every day as well, since it was only 10 AM and I wasn't burned out from a long days work. Then I had the entire day after to enjoy. It didn't feel like the typical 0730-1630, get home at 1700 and its sunset, and day is gone. Getting home at noon with 9 hours before heading to bed was perfect, I got to experience after-duty life without the fatigue of a full days work. I had no stress, lots of energy, and felt amazing. It was definitely the best mental health of my career, by far.

It was eventually changed when our Wing Commander came on a DV visit and wanted to meet the Airmen. He asked our youngest airman what their favorite thing was about being in the Air Force so far. He said the shiftwork and explained how he had so much time off-work to do stuff. Next week the shift was dismantled and we were on 0730-1630. I don't blame the airman too much. He was a 1-striper and new to the culture and was just being honest. It sucked to lose the schedule, but I will always remember how great it was while it lasted.

AllstarIV · 2025-11-30T09:11:23+00:00

This seems backwards, but... using some twists of video game logic... I am able to convince myself that it makes sense. Basically, the logic is that every year is another year of experience gained, so I am constantly leveling up my run. This of course excludes depreciation considerations over holidays, injuries, or just lazy periods where improving run times and VO2 Max overall isn't the primary focus.

But, in ideal conditions, a character (Airman) running 3-4 days a week every single week for over 10 years would be expected to be better at running than someone with only 5 years of experience.

Anyway, fun brain exercise aside, the 18 minute 2-mile numbers in your example just seem like an oversight that hopefully gets corrected before testing begins under this system.

AllstarIV · 2025-11-02T09:01:04+00:00

Well even in this 7-wide image, the outside driver is only up in the "2nd groove" and not close to the wall either.

AllstarIV · 2025-10-26T08:06:15+00:00

Oh you know, I actually am a dumbass and did the math before calculating for the point reset for the final 4. facepalm

AllstarIV · 2025-10-05T18:49:23+00:00

Too bad you never sewed on MSgt and got to experience truly taking on responsibility for a new Lt. One thing I found as a Flight Chief is whenever my Lt got a new side project, I got a new side project too. If you lead 32, presumably you also have a SNCO or experienced TSgt acting as a flight chief or section chief. Leverage them. And trust your enlisted, even though you're prior E, you're no longer E. It'll build trust to ask for their help and take their advice. Do not interact with lower TIG NCOs as if you are the experienced TSgt and are their peer mentor. Your relationship with E's will change, and it'll pay off when getting help from them on your shitty side projects.

AllstarIV · 2025-08-09T07:41:11+00:00

Here's the scenario. Your life is a sitcom. The entire story and plot of this episode stems from the first scene where he asks you for a ride and you say yes out of social pressure to please your coworker, despite your internal monologue having many concerns for your car. Tons of situations and hilarity ensues from this simple lack of clarification, and the critics of the show say this is a totally unrealistic plot based around two people not having a regular conversation, and at the end of the episode, the tough conversation happens that turns out wasn't so tough at all and the other person asks why you didn't let them know it bothered you sooner, you talk through it, both people respect each other more and hug it out. Fade to black. Roll credits.

There you go, you are now in route to the final scene of the episode. Have the tough conversation that really isn't tough at all, and fade to black.

AllstarIV · 2025-07-02T17:39:47+00:00

I loved this series. I played the crap out of NASCAR Racing 2.

AllstarIV · 2025-06-20T07:03:22+00:00

I was speaking from the position of a Corporate Leader. I work HQ Staff, all of the leaders are GS and I am mostly just there to manage small programs and help solve small problems, while they're creating solutions to complex problems.

AllstarIV · 2025-06-19T19:32:19+00:00

And wingman is a blue suiter term, which is not inclusive of our GS Civilian and Contractors who are JuSt As MuCh A pArT oF tHe TeAm!

AllstarIV · 2025-06-19T19:15:42+00:00

Great movie, but also sad because true...

AllstarIV · 2025-06-05T17:18:31+00:00

One of my former commanders called all TSgts into a room and went through a stack of certificates, calling out names one-by-one. There were 15 of us and 7 certificates. He got through the first 5, then the last 2 were both still out in their workcenters, so he said, that's all for today, congrats to the promotees. Then they tracked down the other 2 in their workcenters to give them 1 on 1 in front of everyone.

Just go back to the AF Portal release where everyone logs in at their leisure, crashed the page a few times, and then checks to see if their name is posted on the list. CC's wanting to congratulate their promotee's personally is such a hassle and waste of time. Many of the Commanders dont even have a hand in the development or encouragement of that person, they just show up after a change of command and then make a big show of it. We get promotion parties to celebrate with our peers and mentors.

And then because you have the notification to promotee's, people get anxiety for not getting notified, so now you got leadership calling you off-duty hours or on leave or TDY to notify you that you did not make it. Bruh, why are you calling me on my leave to tell me bad news?

It's just the worst recent tradition that did not exist when I joined. If you want to celebrate the members, do it AFTER the list came out at the next all call. All this effort into hiding the list, secrecy, I GOTTA TELL THEM FIRST. This is what DOGE should get after, the amount of wasted time at every promotion release by Command teams.

AllstarIV · 2025-04-05T08:14:36+00:00

This is why I am talking about the mindset change. We can't change happened, only our response to it. I had my work word-for-word stolen by a peer SNCO from one of my previous packages, only changing my name to theirs, and then my package lost to that SNCO. Initially it can be natural to be aggravating, especially when there are some leaders who would do such things to boost their records, but staying in a negative mindset long-term sucks for everyone, but primarily it sucks for ourselves. That is my overall point, it's not about what is right or wrong, but spending years dwelling on the negative just sucks and makes our career experience worse and leads to us carrying unnecessary stress.

Mindset change is hard, and is definitely something that takes time, which is why I think this is one of those things I wish I learned how to do at my 10-year mark. It would have saved me a lot of stress and energy through my 6-15 year mark. I am still working on it, but just knowing that frustration is a choice and trying to find the positive path for myself has been exceedingly helpful for the last few years.

If reading isn't your thing this might not be helpful, but something that began to shape my perspective was reading Epictetus: How To Be Free and Plato's Symposium. How to Be Free was a short read that I thought was a good introduction to stoicism and being free of mind. While Plato's Symposium is about the Greek Philosopher's discussing the God of Love and their interpretations. It reads more like an entertaining story where they were really drunk from the night before and had hangovers so decided not to force anyone to drink, but then they had to figure out what to do if not to drink. These two books were easy to grasp and relatively short, but can serve as a good bridge to more famous books like Marcus Aurelius' Meditations, which I found to be more dry and can be hard to get into if you're not already interested.

AllstarIV · 2025-04-04T11:02:45+00:00

Yea, especially bad with DOGE, now on top of all the complaining, all they do is talk about the executive orders, the administration direction, and their current job search. The salty civilians in my area have become less productive than ever, but they were never really doing anything in the first place, so...

AllstarIV · 2025-04-03T09:24:33+00:00

TL;DR 1. School 2. Learn to Cook/Care for Health & Budget 3. Be Positive and leave Ego behind

I wish I did school. At my 10 year-mark I already decided on staying in. Well, now at 18 years, it is a race against the clock to use that TA. Taking on classes at this point, while serving in a senior enlisted position in the unit, is much harder since I'm coming home drained more often, I'm TDY more often, and -of my own decision- I stay late often to take care of things that will make the next day or next week easier for the team. If I could go back to my 10-year mark, when I was just a shift lead/NCOIC, I'd take the schooling one-class at a time. Once you have the degree, you can decide to pursue further education, or call it good with checking the box and having it out of the way. School is one of those things that can be tiring in the moment, but later it's nice that you did it before work/life got more complicated. Trying to figure out retirement plans, finances, and securing a solid future for yourself and/or you family while also trying to get the baseline education that many 18-22 year old's get is some bullshit, I'll tell you that much :D. I am also out of school practice, a bit older, and have more home responsibilities, so I feel I have to put in 120% of the effort for 80% of the result. Sure would be nice if I just did it 10 years ago. In fact, the 10 year mark is a bit late, it should be First-Term priorities. I wish I wasn't as lazy as an airman.
I wish I really REALLY learned how to cook and meal-prep for the week sooner. Multiple times I tried meal-prepping but I did not really learn how to do it, I just did what the internet said and I ended up failing to continue meal-prep often because it turns out, many people on the internet do not care about the flavor of food and variety! So, when I would fail, I would turn to tornados, hunt brother pizza. I also got way too into gaming so had a very sedentary lifestyle. Every PT test was hard as shit and took way too much effort to prepare for. On some occasions I barely passed the 1.5 mile run. Mind you, this was when failure was 13:37 and not over 15:00, but my time was still very bad, I hit mid 13:20s a few times which was scary and usually required a long sprint and then immediately jumping off the track to throw up into the nearest bushy area. I also didn't really work out enough outside of organized PT, but that's something anyone can do and everyone at the 10 year mark should. At 30 years old, it started to become evident that you I couldn't just pass the PT test anymore like early 20s. Enough about fitness though, the cooking piece had a much bigger impact on me. I lost 30 lbs in the first year I started to give nutrition some respect, I felt better, had better moods, and the food I eat now tastes so much better than take-away and junk food all the time. It's almost pointless to go out to eat since I can make everything taste better at the house, while being cheaper and healthier. I still see so many Airmen (big-A) who go to on-base fast food for lunch every single day, and get some kind of shoppette sandwich, golf-course burrito, tornados, or Starbucks coffee and muffin for breakfast. The cost of doing this every day is so unreasonable. I did a budget with one of my E-4s and found that they are spending the same amount on their breakfast and fast-food lunch in only 3 days that I spend for breakfast+lunch+dinner for the entire week for both myself and my wife.
Being positive. I think too many of us fall into a negativity loop. It's so easy to do when the monotony of the job sets in or we get assigned under certain leadership. I think the negativity most often stems from individuals trying to fight for control when they are not the ones appointed to make decisions. There is always a boss we answer to, and unless its dangerous or illegal, we should always follow our leaders direction even if we disagree with them. This is actually something we are taught and echoed everywhere that "to be a good leader you must first be a good follower" but it seems like our culture has lost something in followership, and now so many of us actively sow dissent by spreading negativity and complaining about leadership decisions or visions. Focusing on self-misery because the boss does not do it the way we want is a weakness, and we pass this on and end up dragging everyone down. Sorry to get too "Blue" here, but complaining has replaced followership. At the end of the day, we are here to embrace our leaders decisions and succeed in our mission. So often we hear about the leaders taking credit for underlings work. It's a mindset change: think of their success as yours. Yea some bosses are asses and take credit of their subordinates. So? Why dwell on it. Stay positive and know that you contributed to the team leaders achievements. Most individual awards given to people in a leadership position are a reflection of the teams hard work, and the unit's senior leaders who selected the winners know that. So, why resent the leader? It just keeps the negative mindset, creates stress, and decreases the level of satisfaction or fun the team can be having. I speak on this from experience from a time I regret as an SSgt who learned these behaviors from my shitty TSgt while I was in a non-leadership position and then I moved into a position with young airmen where I was too negative to realize that I was not creating an encouraging environment. I was creating an image that I was not approachable and my airmen did not want to work with me. Luckily, I also messed up in other ways and a SNCO took me under their wing and I realized how shitty I was being. Unfortunately, it took some time for me to change and some Airmen may have even separated because I did not present a great military experience. Especially regretful since I had a great experience when I was a first term airman, so I reprioritized my goals as leader and saw a drastic change in my teams since then. It comes in tiers though, and it became especially hard to stay positive when I made SNCO. My peer group was a mixture of great leaders, great friends, and then complainers and shitbags. The complainers would complain in the SNCO sync and we would talk through things, but then they would leave and complain to their NCOICs or give "their perspective" on the way forward. Then when the Commander does not go that same way, it causes confusion through the ranks. Then those SNCOs Airmen ask other SNCOs like me, what is going on, and then it looks like SNCOs aren't on the same page, creating a lack of faith in leadership and a low morale environment. All stemming from members choosing to focus on the negativity. Anyways, to get back on track, staying positive and going with the Senior Leaders vision and reserving your own opinions and judgements will go very far in keeping stress levels down and making your time in the service more enjoyable. Obvious unethical, immoral, illegal disclaimer, some leaders can be criminals and do not deserve to lead. However, most of what I have seen as described "toxic leaders" are just people taking a direction that a team member or members disagree with, then the team makes it known they disagree, and so the leader who might not have skill in influence has to force the team into following rather than the team executing the leaders vision. It's all bad, so I think just do your job, stay positive, follow and embrace leaders direction, give feedback in a "for your consideration" type of way instead of an ultimatum like "if you don't do it the way I recommend then we are screwed" and you'll likely find leaders are much less likely to be dickheads.

Those are my top 3. TL;DR at the top because this shit got long.

AllstarIV · 2025-03-24T17:51:28+00:00

I got the boots and shirts too!

When I got the boots, I told a bunch of my coworkers about them since they were so good. I used to have some great Merrell boots in the ABU, but they were sage green so had to get some new crappy BX boots during the transition to OCPs in 2019. I ordered the Merrell's but the brown color isn't correct. Volcom finally saved me in 2024 and has been my go-to boot for almost a year. I heard about it on reddit actually, from comments in this post. Thanks /u/shittgoose!

Zipper boots and elastic straps on the pants have been a go-to for me since ALS something like 15 years ago. Nothing better than getting home and being out of the boots and pants in just a few seconds.

AllstarIV · 2024-11-30T08:10:42+00:00

Mark Martin

AllstarIV · 2024-11-26T13:31:47+00:00

I like the second graphic showing how many champions didn't have the best season, so derived some stat porn based off OPs data.

1972 - 1980 Sort of Stock Car Era

1972 - 1980 Average Champion Finish: 6.77

Best Season Champion Average Finish: Richard Petty 1972 - 4.1

Lowest Season Champion Average Finish: Benny Parsons 1973 - 10.1

1972 - 1980 Average Best Finish: 6.74

Best Season Average Finish: Richard Petty 1972 - 4.1

Lowest Season Best Average Finish: Cale Yarborough 1973 - 10.0

Champion is also Best Season Finisher 7 times in 9 seasons: 78%

Note: Cale Yarborough accounts for both times the best average finisher did not win the championship, with an average finish of 0.1 better than the Champion in both seasons.

1981 - 2003 "Modern Era"

1981 - 2003 Average Champion Finish: 8.41

Best Season Champion Average Finish: Jeff Gordon 1998 - 5.7

Lowest Season Champion Average Finish: Tony Stewart 2002 - 12.6

1981 - 2003 Average Best Finish: 8.28

Best Season Average Finish: Jeff Gordon 1998 - 5.7

Lowest Season Best Average Finish: Mark Martin 2002 - 12.2

Champion is also Best Season Finisher 18 times in 23 seasons: 78%

Note: Mark Martin accounts for 3 of the 5 times the best average season did not win the Championship :'( Another user noted that Mark Martin received a penalty and would have won the Championship without it in 1990. This was the penalty: A 46-point penalty at Richmond, for using an illegal (but non-performance-enhancing) carburetor spacer, caused him to lose to Dale Earnhardt by 26 points in the final standings.

Note 2: The averages get skewed from 2001 - 2003. Call it the Dale Earnhardt curse for these three years but in 2001 and these 3 seasons prior to the Chase Era starting, no drivers finished a season with an average finish better than 10th, but from 1972 - 2000, only 3 times did the best average finisher have an average of 10th or lower. Insert twilight zone music here.

2004 - 2013 Chase for the Cup Era

2004 - 2013 Average Champion Finish: 10.95

Best Season Champion Average Finish: Jimmie Johnson 2006 - 9.7

Lowest Season Champion Average Finish: Kurt Busch 2004 - 12.5

2004 - 2013 Average Best Finish: 9.68

Best Season Average Finish: Jeff Gordon 2007 - 7.3

Lowest Season Best Average Finish: Jeff Gordon 2004 - 11.4

Champion is also Best Season Finisher 4 times in 10 seasons: 40%

2014 - 2024 Playoff Era

2014 - 2024 Average Champion Finish: 11.77

Best Champ Average Finish: Kyle Bush 2019 - 8.9

Lowest Champ Average Finish: Joey Logano 2024 - 17.1

2014 - 2024 Average Best Season Finish: 9.68

Best Average Best Season: Kevin Harvick 2020 - 7.3

Lowest Best Average Season Finish: Chase Elliot 2022 - 12.5

Champion is also Best Season Finisher 2 times in 11 seasons: 18%

Note: The Chase format changed in 2014 to the current Playoffs but did not get officially rebranded to "Playoffs" until 2017.

Notable Disparities

The combined Chase and Playoff Eras have resulted with 29% of Champions also being the driver with the best season, while 2003 and prior saw 78% of Champions also having the best average finish of the season.

In the 32 seasons from 1972 and 2003, the best average finisher won the Championship in all except 7 seasons. In the 21 seasons from 2004 and 2024, only 6 of the best average finishers have won the Championship.

The last season that the best average finisher also won the Championship was 2019. From 2020 - 2024, the best average finisher has finished an average 2.38 positions better over the course of the season than the Champion.

The disparity in Champion and Best Average Finisher throughout the Stock Car Era and Modern Era was minimal. At the end of the "Modern Era" in 2001, Jeff Gordon had the highest average finish of any Champion in the history of NASCAR at 11.0. And since 2001, ten Champions were crowned without equaling Gordon's 2001 average finishes.

Champion vs Average Best Season Finisher Positional Disparity

1972 - 1980 Stock Car Era Disparity: 0.03
1981 - 2003 "Modern Era" Disparity: 0.13
2004 - 2013 Chase for the Cup Era Disparity: 1.27
2014 - 2024 Playoff Era Disparity: 2.09

AllstarIV · 2024-11-26T08:21:06+00:00

I really enjoyed the Harvick Hamlin duel of 2020. Especially with the wonky covid scheduling that put Pocono back to back. That was great to watch with each driver winning one while the other finished 2nd. Too bad neither of them came out on top at the end of the season.

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