Car of Tomorrow - Not the Right Kind of New Car Smell

The Car of Tomorrow stinks.  No, really!  During the Phoenix race, some of the drivers were complaining about the fumes.  But that's just a small part of their complaints.  Apparently, a lot of the top guys feel they aren't really race cars. 

The CoT was created to make a safer car and one that also provides better competition.  They wanted a car that would not only have more passing, but side-by-side duels.  Want to know what the drivers say? 

"I could see the leaders almost the whole race, and it was like we all were just out there running the exact same lap times.  It was a parade. I was bored.  No one could pass anybody else -- we were all equal it seemed."  -- Dale Earnhardt Jr.

"To be as nice as I can...it's frustrating.  People will say, 'But went from the back to the front.'  But,yeah, it took us 300 laps to do it when it shouldn't have.  Our car was just that much better than everyone else's...I don't know how we're going to run these cars on bigger tracks without changes."  -- Denny Hamlin

"I only saw what was around me, but it didn't look like a good race, really, to me.  I didn't see a lot of side-by-side, I didn't see everybody equal.  I saw everybody sliding all over the place.  And NASCAR's claim to fame is they want them hard to drive.  Well, it's not that they're hard to drive, it's just that they're not like driving a race car.  They're like giving us Pinewood derby cars and saying, 'OK, everybody, this is what you're going to race.'"  -- Greg Biffle

But, you know, not everyone is unhappy...although I think that sometimes where you finish the race determines how you feel about the car.  Just ask Jeff Gordon:

    "Well, I be honest with you; it was better than I thought it was going to be.  I really thought that once you got out front, all you had to do was just mirror drive and there's no way that ugy had a chance.  But Tony got by me and then I got by him." 

Okay, not a ringing endorsement, but his teammate Jimmie Johnson had some good things to say, too:
   
    "If this had been last year's car, with that bumper, I would have been wrecked.  It seems like these cars are more forgiving.  You can't just knock the guy out of the way, you actually have to pass him."

I'll withhold my own judgment till I see them race a little more.  It will be interesting.