Ah, now wasn't that nice? As much as even the most ardent fan or competitor enjoys the drama of the Sprint Cup Series, a weekend off from racing every now and then soothes the soul and refreshes depleted human batteries.

Thanks to the Easter holiday, last weekend was the first one off for the Sprint Cup folks since Speedweeks opened at Daytona International Speedway in early February.

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Another weekend off looms in mid-April, in between the April 12 Subway Fresh Fit 500 at Phoenix and the Aaron's 499 at Talladega. Then there will be non-stop racing all the way through until mid-July, when a weekend respite is scheduled between the Chicagoland 400 and the Allstate 400 at the Brickyard.

And that's it. Then it's a consecutive 16-week run through to the season finale -- the Ford 400 at Homestead-Miami Speedway.

This isn't the first time this has been pointed out, but the season is ridiculously long. All one needs to do to realize the obvious logic of that statement is examine the lengths of the seasons of other major sports, including colleges because they're big business, too.

Sprint Cup opens in early February and doesn't end until just before Thanksgiving. It adds up to roughly 9 1/2 months, with only the three weekends off during its grueling duration.

Comparison shopping

Let's start our comparison journey by taking a look at college basketball, since March Madness currently has the nation in its grip like virtually no other sport can. They start playing in November and the national title game is history by the first week in April -- a total of roughly five months.

College football is about the same, maybe a little longer for those two teams fortunate enough to play in the national title game. But they begin play in August and wrap up by mid- to late January.

From start to finish, the regular season and playoffs all the way through the Super Bowl in the National Football League is about five months. Even if you throw in a month of training camp and preseason games, it's still only six months long.

Major League Baseball's season seems at times to drag on endlessly. Seriously, is it really necessary to play 162 regular-season games and then begin the now-lengthened playoffs, which can add up to an extra five weeks? Yet baseball still wraps up its business within a total of about seven months.

The National Basketball Association, sagging in popularity in recent years, is about the closest to Sprint Cup in terms of its outlandish schedule length -- and perhaps there is a correlation there. The NBA regular season gets going in November and playoffs aren't completed until mid- to late June, adding up to about 7 1/2 months -- more like 8 1/2 if you count roughly a month of training camp and preseason games.

Oh, and the NHL? Who cares? We're talking major sports here -- ones that lots of folks care about, and ones that can draw more than a blip on national television radar these days. (Continued)