In the midst of all the point calculating and recalculating that went on Sunday evening, there was plenty you may have missed. I'm talking about stuff that may not have seemed important at the time, or for that matter, even now. But hey, it's the kind of stuff that I find fascinating, so I thought you might too.
Four-Peat Club
As we are all now plenty aware, Jimmie Johnson is the first NASCAR racer ever to win four consecutive titles --- emphasis on NASCAR. Others in other disciplines have won four or more. And don't think that Jimmie hasn't already propped these folks up as his next target. Here they are:
• Michael Schumacher won five consecutive Formula One titles from 2000-04, bringing his career title total to seven. The first two came back-to-back with the Benetton team in 1994-95, after which he went to the then-struggling Ferrari outfit. He finished second in points in '98 and his final season of '06.
• Valentino Rossi was a five-peater in MotoGP (think F1 for motorcycles) from 2001-05. He also came close to making it even more, finishing second in '06 and third in '07 before winning back-to-back titles in '08-'09.
• If we leave the racing world, the Boston Celtics are still the gold, er, green standard with eight-straight NBA titles. Led by Bill Russell, the Celts cut down the nets every year between 1959 and '66.
• The Wizard, John Wooden, coached UCLA to seven consective NCAA basketball championships, beginning in 1967 and ending in '73. After losing to N.C. State in the '74 Final Four, the Bruins came back to win another title in '75.
• The New York Yankees won five consecutive World Series with Joe DiMaggio and company from 1949-53.
• Hockey has had two four-time champs, the Montreal Canadiens (1976-79) and the New York Islanders (1980-83).
We Are The Champions
With his fourth Cup, Jimmie parted ways with a group of four legends on the all-time champions list. He is now one of only four men to ever win more than three NASCAR titles. Seven drivers are in the two-timers club.
Jimmie Johnson isn't the only one breaking new ground with this title. When Johnson tied Cale Yarborough's record of three straight (1976-78), Chad Knaus became the only crew chief to win three Cups in a row. Yarborough's first two titles came with legendary wrenchman Herb Nab atop the pit box. The third came with co-crew chiefs Travis Carter and current ESPN analyst Tim Brewer.
Where does Knaus rank among all crew chiefs in Cups won? We thought you might ask that. Interesting note: they all won back-to-back titles at least once.
Hendrick Motorsports swept the top three spots in the final points standings, which marks the first time that's ever been done. Here's the closest anyone's come to taking the top three, keeping in mind that the three-plus car organization didn't become the norm until the last decade: Roush Racing put an amazing five cars in the top 10 in points in 2005, but didn't win the Cup. Greg Biffle, Carl Edwards, and Mark Martin finished 2-3-4 behind, of course, Jimmie Johnson.
*Baker, Thomas and Thompson finished 1-2-3 in driver points, but not all of their starts were made in Kiekhaefer-owned cars.
Other Odds and Ends
• Johnson's 141-point margin of victory was the largest in the six years that the Chase format has been in place.
• He lost the first Chase in 2004 by the closest margin yet produced by the Chase, or for that matter any other points system, finishing just eight points behind Kurt Busch.
• J.J. achieved his four titles in 291 career starts, breaking the record held by teammate/friend/co-car owner Jeff Gordon, who won his four Cups in -- get this -- 292 starts.
• Mark Martin finished second for the fifth time in his career, moving him into a tie with Richard Petty for most runner-up seasons. Of course, The King also won seven titles. Martin is still stuck on zero.
Throttle Linkage
• The Miami-Herald's Greg Cote says that for Johnson making history is more important than making fans.
• ESPN.com's David Newton asks Dale Jr. about his recent appearance in The Enquirer and gets a question right back at him.
Once again, it's time to tunnel into the numbers of the Chase like an earthworm hopped up on Red Bull. For the final time this year, we'll rank the Chasers in order of their chances at this week's track. This time, it's the 1.5-mile Homestead-Miami Speedway, which has been reconfigured more times than Joan Rivers' face.
As always, I rank the 12 Chasers in order of who I think has the best chance of winning this weekend, based on their career numbers at HMS, recent momentum and how they finished the last time we visited South Florida. Every week I am flooded with "What the hell is a Driver Rating?" questions. If you dare to explore that NASA-like math, check out this explanation from One Bad Wheel. Hint: Anything over 100 is very, very good. Current points rankings are in parentheses.
After glancing at the digits, five quick observations:
1. Surprisingly, only four of the Chase guys have won here.
2. Don't read too much into Tony Stewart's two wins. They came in the first two races he ran at Homestead and were on the old configuration. His average finish in his other 10 starts is 12th.
3. Don't read too much into Jimmie Johnson's generic average finish and his lack of wins. Much like this weekend, he rarely comes to the season finale actually needing a win, rather he's just trying to hit a target finishing position to clinch a championship.
4. If Roush is going to end its season on a high note, as in its first non-plate win since the season's second race, then this is the place to do it. Roush Fenway Fords have won seven of the last eight HMS events -- Kurt Busch won there in '02, Greg Biffle in '04-'06 and Carl Edwards one year ago. Edwards is trying to avoid being skunked after winning nine races in '08. Biffle is trying to avoid going 0-for-season for the first time in his seven-year Cup career.
5. Man, has Brian Vickers had some God-awful career numbers at all of these Chase tracks.
** Driver Rating has been compiled by NASCAR since 2005
*** Martin ran a partial schedule in 2008
The "Why We Call Richard Petty The King" Fact Of The Week
His Royal Fastness was retired long before the Homestead-Miami Speedway opened in 1999, but that doesn't mean that The King doesn't still rule the Sunshine State.
In all, eight different Florida tracks have hosted NASCAR Grand National/Cup Series events. Petty raced on three of them -- the Daytona International Speedway, the Golden Gate Speedway in Tampa and the Speedway Park in Jacksonville. He won on two. The first was a victory in the only race ever run at Golden Gate, in November 1962. And his records at Daytona will likely never be broken, with 10 wins in all, including an amazing seven Daytona 500 victories. The next closest active drivers are Jeff Gordon, with six wins, and Tony Stewart and Michael Waltrip with three each.
Racing With The Stars
I'm sure you've spent all week jonesing for info to fill out your NASCAR Celebrity Chase Tracker fantasy league brackets. As always, I'm here for you.
As we told you last week, the competition for the 2009 NCCT has been hot and heavy between a pair of unlikely rivals -- U.S. Congressman Patrick McHenry and Foreigner, as in the original Juke Box Heroes.
Last weekend at Phoenix, likely spurred by the appearance of fellow Republican John McCain, the Congressman had a big day. He opened up an 18-point lead over the 50 million album-selling band, thanks to strong efforts by Mark Martin, Jeff Gordon, Jimmie Johnson and Denny Hamlin. The rockers were treated "Cold As Ice" by their pick to win, Ryan Newman, who finished 20th.
Now Mick Jones and company find themselves in a real life Battle of the Bands. Suddenly hot on their heels is John Ondrasnik of Five For Fighting, who is followed closely by professional bowler Danny Wiseman and celebrity chef Mario Batali.
After a brief hiatus, we now return you to the only place where rubber dust, carbon monoxide and Crisco combine to form a taste in one's mouth that only a true race fan can appreciate. I'm talking about the first five rows up against the catch fence, where earplugs are a necessity, but, still, no one wears them.
Yes, we're talking about the Chicken Bone Section, a catchall for everything we love as gearheads, grease monkeys and decibel addicts. So, without further ado, let us proceed into the deliciousness that is the leftovers under the dinner table of motorsports.
Taking Infield
Ryan McGee
Go ahead and take your best shot.
Last month we presented you with the most American bus that ever rolled off a Motor City assembly line, modified for racing, sleeping and honoring our founding fathers -- Washington, Franklin and Earnhardt. I spotted it in the Lowe's Motor Speedway infield, parked across the main infield thoroughfare from the media lot.
I asked for your best photo captions and you delivered, the winner coming from Mike Davis, Dale Earnhardt Junior's PR rep: "THESE COLORS DON'T RUN. No really, they don't run. Clete, gimme a jump?"
This week I give you a photo of the man who may very well have tricked-out said bus. I spotted this fine American while descending through the actual Chicken Bone Section at the Martinsville Speedway en route to the pits for the prerace ceremonies.
Once again, I'd like you take your best crack at a caption for my new hero. You can email them to mcgeespn@yahoo.com or Tweet me at @RyanMcGeeESPN. We'll post the best ones next week as part of our post-Homestead, pre-Thanksgiving festivities.
This Ain't Your Grandpappy's NASCAR
Been getting a lot of "ewwww" emails and Tweets about yesterday's Muscle Car Thong link in the Dr. Racy Ryan column. As Johnny used to say to Bob Barker ... "But wait! There're more!"
I'm not sure what's scarier, the fact that I found a men's version on eBay or that the ladies' version was listed on Google as available for $7.99, "used."
For Your Viewing Pleasure
Rarely do I make a trip to the racetrack that someone doesn't bring up ESPN's uber-popular "Ride Along Program" ad campaign of the late 1990s. Well, thanks to the magic of YouTube, the RAP lives again, albeit grainier than you may have remembered.
The Nashville Fairgrounds Speedway, formerly the Nashville Speedway, was supposed to run its final race with last month's All-American 400. But an unfavorable weather forecast forced the 51-year-old track to postpone the American Speed Association event to this weekend.
To Music City race fans, that meant a few more weeks to relive the memories before the half-mile, high-banked oval is padlocked for good. They've been racing at the fairgrounds since 1904 and NASCAR ran Cup races there as recently as 1984, and Nationwide and Trucks until the new suburban Nashville Superspeedway opened its doors in 2001.
"I just can't imagine it not being there," says three-time Cup champ Darrell Waltrip, who came south from Kentucky to make his name in Nashville before moving to NASCAR. "You just assume it would always be there, you know?"
The land, which includes the track, fairgrounds and exposition center, is city-owned and the municipal leaders have decided to redevelop the 100-plus acre area to try to boost a side of town that has been on a slow economic decline for the last couple of decades. The gates won't officially be locked until June, but track operators say running a half-schedule in 2010 would be a waste of time.
More on this as the actual closure approaches, but in the meantime read this farewell from The Tennessean's Larry Woody, who covered more Nashville races than all other writers and reporters combined.
Music City Farewell II
Two of the men who made their names at the fairgrounds were Coo Coo Marlin and his son Sterling. While Nashville says goodbye to the old track this weekend, Sterling will be saying goodbye to his Cup career down at Homestead-Miami. He's retiring after more than three decades on the job and, of course, back-to-back Daytona 500 wins in 1994-95.
Next week I'll look back on some Sterling memories. Until then, send me some of your own, will you?
In Case You Missed It
If you happened to hit the Hooters on Bruton Smith Boulevard in Concord, N.C. over the weekend (I'm not saying that I did, I'm just saying if I had), then you couldn't have swung an inappropriate T-shirt without hitting a half-dozen NASCAR champions.
Stock car champs from all over the country -- track, state and national touring series -- spent an entire week racing from event to event as part of the first-ever NASCAR Champions Week. There were kart races, photo shoots, visits to race shops and, yes, I am told, some adult beverages were consumed after hours.
The events culminated with the NASCAR Whelen All-American Series banquet on Friday night and the big show, the NASCAR Night of Champions Touring Series Awards Gala on Saturday. Among those honored were George Brunnhoelzl III (Whelen Southern Modified Tour), Donny Lia (Whelen Modified Tour), Philip Morris (Whelen All-American Series), Andrew Ranger (Canadian Tire Series presented by Mobil 1) and Ryan Truex (Camping World Series East).
In case you're wondering, Ryan Truex is Martin's little brother.
The one champ missing from the big banquet was Camping World Series West title-winner Jason Bowles. Why? Because Bowles had to bail Thursday morning and head west to Phoenix to make his NASCAR Nationwide Series debut.
"Yeah, I kind of have mixed feelings about it," he told me while standing in the studios of NASCAR Now in South Charlotte last Wednesday. "I really wanted to be there to celebrate the amazing season we had. But when someone gives you a chance to move up the ladder, even for a race, you take it."
Bowles, who won the CW West event at PIR earlier this year, finished 31st in Saturday's race.
Once again, it is time to open your minds and hearts to the healing powers of the worldwide interweb's only motorsports advice columnist, Dr. Racy Ryan.
After a few weeks' absence for what was a totally bogus investigation by the National Union of Trained Sociologists (NUTS), the good doctor is back and has sifted through thousands (as far as you know) of e-mails and letters from readers concerned about life and racing.
So turn down the lights, set fire to your favorite hero card, call upon the spirits of Ann Landers and Tiny Lund and let the healing begin!
Dear Dr. Ryan,
I was so excited when you and Marty Smith reported that my personal hero, Danica Patrick, was signing with JR Motorsports for 2010. My excitement may have gotten the best of me, though. I changed the names of my seven cats to Danica, Dan, Danny, Patty, Patrick, DP and GoDaddy.com. My friends say that my obsession is unhealthy. What do you think and when is this Danica/Junior deal finally going down?
Whiskers in Wild Cat, Ky.
Dear Whiskers,
As Marty and I both reported, the deal -- as it stood two weeks ago, Wednesday -- was "in the final stages." Despite reports over the weekend that had Rick Hendrickdenying any impending deal, my sources say that timetable is still in place, which means the contract is still being worked out. As we said then, an announcement isn't expected until after the NASCAR season is done. As for you, there is a feline, er, fine line between being a fan and being insane. It's time to take a long look into the milk bowl, my friend. The face looking back at you is, I am sad to say, the Crazy Cat Lady. And history (not to mention my ninth-grade geometry teacher, who always smelled like Fancy Feast) says there is no cure for that.
Dear Racy Ryan,
My husband loves muscle cars. I think he may love them more than he loves me. When Ford announced it would run the Mustang in the Nationwide Series in 2010, he didn't pay any attention to me for a week. When Dodge unveiled the Challenger he ignored me again. Thing is, he's really more of a Camaro guy, so I am afraid that if Chevy ever decides to enter one into the Nationwide Series he may never look my way again! Is our relationship doomed?
Feeling Deprived in Needmore, W.V.
Dear Deprived,
I have good news and bad news. The good news is you will have one less car to compete with. The bad news is the rest of us are the ones being deprived. General Motors continues to be adamant about not fielding a Camaro in the Nationwide Series. GM's racing group manager, Pat Suhy has said repeatedly that the company doesn't want to compromise the car's unique body shape to fit NASCAR's new Nationwide COT templates, though the league has proven its generosity on such matters based on the distinct noses on both the Mustang and Challenger. Until they come to their senses, we'll have to settle for a decidedly non-pony car, the Chevy Impala. As for your relationship problems, you need to do two things. One, join OctaneGirls.net and bone-up on your Muscle Car knowledge. You start talking about trailer queens and resto-mods at the dinner table and he's going to start listening. Two, start wearing some of these around the house. If that doesn't work, make him sleep in his muscle car. Or make him wear a pair of the fancy undies around the house.
Dear Racy Ryan,
Settle a bet between me and the guy I share a cubicle with at work. I say that Junior Johnson won the first NASCAR championship, but he says it was a guy I have never heard of named Red Bryan. Which one of us is right? We have a week's worth of Taco Bell riding on this.
Out To Lunch in Picnic, Fla.
Dear Lunch,
Tell your friend to grab a case of Pepcid AC, because he's right. Sort of. Red Byron, not Bryan, won the NASCAR Strictly Stock title in 1949. And he did it with a left leg that was mangled so badly that he had to wear a brace, which was bolted to the clutch whenever he was behind the wheel. What happened to his leg? It was blown apart by Japanese antiaircraft fire during his stint as an engineer/tail-gunner during World War II. On his 58th and final mission, his B-24 was shot down over the Aleutian Islands in the North Pacific. He spent two years enduring leg reconstruction surgeries, but when he finally got back home to Alabama he went back to doing what he'd done before the war -- he drove racecars. And he won the first NASCAR championship driving for Raymond Parks, a moonshiner turned team owner. Byron and Parks were both on the list of nominees for the inaugural NASCAR Hall of Fame class, but weren't voted in.
Dear Racy Ryan,
I recently picked up a copy of the National Enquirer to read my horoscope and was dismayed to see my favorite driver, Dale Earnhardt Jr., on the cover with a story that says he's "stuck in a death spiral" over his inability to perform on the racetrack. Is there any truth to this story? If so, how do I keep myself from slipping into the same funk?
Flipping Out in Flippen, Ga.
Dear Flipping,
I stumbled upon that story as well while I was filling out my page-25 order form for a Wondrous Winter Pre-Lit Pull-Up Christmas Tree by Thomas Kinkade (aka the Painter of Light). But Flipping, never believe anything you ever read in a grocery-store-aisle newspaper. Did you also believe that the Bat Boy was the reason the Yankees won Game 3 of the World Series? I recommend that you take that paper, roll it up, douse it with Dale Junior Edition Drakkar Noir, light it on fire with an official Dale Junior lighter and toss the flaming rag it into an official Dale Junior trash can. If the trash can catches fire, call the fire department with a Dale Junior cell phone.
All right folks, that'll do it for this edition of Dr. Racy Ryan, the Internet's only motorsports advice columnist. Keep those questions coming and, until next time, remember: It's not that other people don't like you, it's that you don't like you.
There is no one -- and I am including Jimmie Johnson here -- that doesn't want to see Mark Martin win a Sprint Cup Series championship. At 50, he now races against younger drivers who grew up as Mark Martin fans. And, as happens in sports, even those fans who used to boo him lustily during his days as one of Dale Earnhardt's greatest foils, now give him standing ovations each and every week during prerace driver introductions. Just last week he was named NASCAR Illustrated's Person of the Year.
But after Sunday's race at Phoenix -- despite finishing fourth -- his shoulders were drooped. He knew, like we all did, that yet another Cup had been won right off the nose of his ride. "I have lost them to the best," he said with a shrug. "Earnhardt, Stewart, Gordon, and now maybe Jimmie. And yes, he has to be in any conversation about the best."
That kind of humility is why if -- when -- Martin finally ends his lifelong quest for the Cup, we will see a celebration that might match the garage-wide eruption of joy that came after Dale Earnhardt's 1998 Daytona 500 victory.
But until then, Mark Martin will have to continue to live with the title "Best Driver Never to Win a Championship." Here's a look at Mark's record four runner-up finishes (with, barring a "2012"-ish natural disaster this weekend, number five on deck). After Sunday's season finale we'll either be able to toss this list into the shredder forever or I'll be updating it for next year.
On February 25, 1990, Martin had earned the second win of his still-new career, a hard-fought Richmond victory over Dale Earnhardt and his old short track buddy Rusty Wallace. Jack Roush, in just his third season as a team owner, was still celebrating with his driver when the word came from the garage. During post-race inspection, the aluminum spacer beneath the carburetor of the No. 6 Ford was found to be 2.5 inches thick. The legal limit was two inches. The win stood, but Roush and Martin were hit with a $40,000 fine and docked 46 points.
Roush filed an appeal, saying that it was an honest mistake and on a short track it provided no real advantage. His pleas fell on deaf ears.
Again, at the time, it seemed like no big deal. But nine months later it became a gigantic deal when Martin lost the Cup by 26 points. Without the Richmond misstep he would've won it by 20 points.
1994: Not even close
Finished 2nd behind: Dale Earnhardt
How far back: 444 points
Four years later, Martin finished second to Earnhardt yet again. This time, The Intimidator romped him and everyone else. "Truthfully, we weren't the second-place car that year," Martin recalled to me during an interview for what was supposed to be a pre-retirement feature in ESPN The Magazine. "Ernie Irvan was. But he'd had his [near fatal Michigan] crash that summer."
Martin closed out the season with a second-place finish at Phoenix and a win at the Atlanta finale, slipping past Wallace to finish second behind Earnhardt, who had already clinched his seventh Cup title with three races remaining in the season.
NASCAR's 50th anniversary season ended up becoming one of the greatest one-man demolition jobs in American motorsports history. Jeff Gordon won 13 races, tying Richard Petty's Modern Era record. The closest Martin came during the final six races of the year was 174 points -- more than a full race. "Our undoing that year was restrictor-plate races," Martin remembered. He was right. Of the 364 points he lost to Gordon throughout the year, 321 came at Daytona and Talladega.
The good news? He whipped third place Dale Jarrett as badly as Gordon whipped him, outdistancing Jarrett by 345 points.
With seven races to go, it looked like Martin's biggest Cup competition was going to be out-of-nowhere rookie sensation Jimmie Johnson. At Talladega, Martin and Johnson started the race on the front row, thanks to a Friday time trials rainout. During the parade laps, Martin's steering wheel went wonky and he wrecked into Johnson's Chevy before the green flag had even been dropped. Martin finished 30th, Johnson 37th and second-place finisher Tony Stewart moved into the points lead.
Martin finished second in the season's second-to-last event at Rockingham. But once again, he was bitten by post-race inspection when a front spring didn't meet the minimum number of coils. Martin was docked 25 points. Roush filed a last-minute appeal, which was heard during a special hearing the day before the race weekend started. It was denied.
Instead of entering the Homestead-Miami finale 64 points in arrears, he trailed Stewart by 89. He finished fourth on the night and lost the title by 38.
After yet another bridesmaid season, Martin was once again gracious in defeat. Roush? Not so much, as he re-invoked the angry memories and conspiracy claims of 1990. The following year, Roush finally earned his elusive championship when Matt Kenseth won the Cup. Kurt Busch added number two the following fall. Martin? He's still waiting.
Credit where credit is due
NASCAR has endured more than its share of criticism over its substance abuse policy since former Truck Series driver Aaron Fike's April 2008 admission that he'd used heroin on the same days that he'd raced.
On January 1, 2009, NASCAR replaced the previous 20-year-old "reasonable suspicion" policy with a random testing procedure that is administered by Nashville-based Aegis Labs.
Throughout the '09 season the sanctioning body has been called out by critics for a lack of transparency and a hard-to-find list of banned substances, particularly as the Jeremy Mayfield debacle grew ugly throughout late spring and early summer. But when you take a moment to remember where they were just one year ago -- basically at zero -- and where they are now -- nearly a dozen crew members and one driver have been caught and suspended -- it really is quite remarkable how they have gotten this cumbersome battleship turned.
One group that has taken notice is a newspaper that doesn't exactly have a reputation of being easily impressed: the Wall Street Journal. Late last week, the WSJ analyzed and ranked 22 sports leagues on the effectiveness of their substance abuse programs. They used what they call a "clarity quotient," with 100 being the highest possible score. Anything under 50 is considered "insufficient."
NASCAR's not-yet year-old policy scored an even 90.0 and ranked fifth out of 22, trailing only the international organizations that govern boxing, the Olympics, tennis and track and field. The NFL was ranked ninth (72.5), the NBA 13th (57.5), Major League Baseball 17th (56.2) and the NCAA 18th (55.0).
In case you were wondering, the bottom rung was held by the X Games with a 15.0, barely nipping the Canadian Football League and the World's Strongest Man Competition.
Once again, it's time to burrow deep and get all dirtied up in the numbers concerning the Chase racers' chances at this week's track, in this case the one-mile flat "roval" (road course + oval) of the Phoenix International Raceway.
As always, I rank the 12 Chasers in order of who I think has the best chance of winning this weekend, based on their career numbers at PIR, recent momentum and how they ran there in the spring. After glancing at the digits, I have two immediate observations: (1) Last week it was amazing how many different Chasers had won at Texas, eight of the 12. This week it is amazing how few have won at Phoenix, only five of the dozen. (2) Mark Martin needs to win perhaps more this weekend than any other during his storied career, and that's exactly what he did back in April. His lifetime numbers suggest he can do it again. Unfortunately, Jimmie Johnson's résumé is even better. Current points rankings are in parentheses.
* Subway Fresh Fit 500, won by Mark Martin
** Driver Rating has been compiled by NASCAR since 2005
NASCAR numerology, Friday the 13th edition
Here on Friday the 13th, why not take a look at the most taboo of numbers and its history on the doors of NASCAR Cup Series stock cars. For a notoriously superstitious bunch, a surprisingly large number of drivers have taken their crack at the 1-3.
But don't get the impression that they've been fighting over it. They haven't. A total of 110 single- or double-digit numbers have been used in Cup competition history. (How about 110? Don't forget 00-09.) The number 13 ranks 92nd in races run with 259.
The first driver to use it was by Texan Pat Kirkwood, who ran the Langhorne Speedway in just the fourth race in NASCAR's history. The most recent has been Max Papis, who ran at Talladega two weeks ago.
They both finished 29th.
Thirteen's only win came via an Indy Car legend and it came in a race that no longer counts as an actual win, though it did then. On Feb. 22, 1963, eventual three-time Indy 500 winner Johnny Rutherford won a 40-lap Daytona 500 qualifier, the predecessor of today's Gatorade Duels, driving for legendary mechanic Smokey Yunick.
"That was the first NASCAR event I'd ever run," Lone Star J.R. recalls. "I didn't think much about the car number and I don't know why Smokey ran it, but it was a super fast little Chevy."
The biggest 13-based disaster came in 1998, when Dan Marino joined forces with Bill Elliott to field a Ford for driver Jerry Nadeau and put the quarterback's jersey number on the side and colors on the hood (see it here). It lasted one race past 13 starts before an ugly public feud between Nadeau and Elliott ended in an even more public divorce.
"Why we call Richard Petty The King" fact of the week
The King started the first five Cup races ever run at Phoenix and the results were, as is the case with a lot of races in the final seasons of his career, terrible. He averaged a 27th place start and a 33rd place finish, with no laps led.
However, those struggles haven't kept the Grand Canyon State from loving His Royal Fastness.
Need proof? On Thursday afternoon the Phoenix International Raceway dropped the green flag on the Richard Petty Raceway, a karting track located just outside PIR's Gate 4. For $20, fans 16 and older can don a helmet and firesuit and slip behind the wheel of the same pro-style karts that started the careers of nearly every driver in the NASCAR garages. The karts and track will be maintained by the Richard Petty Driving Experience racing school. The 1/16-mile oval is 20 feet wide and modeled after PIR's unique layout, complete with a flagstand, tire barriers, pits and spectator zones. On Friday at 2 p.m. MT, The King himself will stop by to officially dedicate the track. So, will he be mixing it up on his namesake oval?
"Probably not," Petty said when I asked him last week. "The boss lady [wife Lynda] told me in '92 that once I got out of a racecar I had to stay out. I have up to this point -- pretty much, anyway -- so I don't think I'll be breaking her rule at Phoenix. If so, she might break something on me."
Racing with the stars
The actual Chase for the Cup may be teetering on a blowout, but the Celebrity Chase Tracker needs no such help. What is the Celebrity Chase Tracker? NASCAR's PR office recruited a roster of celebs and asked them to make their predictions on what would happen to whom during the 10 Chase events. The result has been a pretty nice little showdown between a couple of unlikely rivals.
U.S. Congressman Patrick McHenry, R-N.C., heads into the final two races of the year tied with Foreigner. As in Foreigner the rock band.
This weekend McHenry has picked Kyle Busch as the race winner and says that Mark Martin will lead all Chasers in the final finishing order, followed by Jeff Gordon, Denny Hamlin, Jimmie Johnson and Tony Stewart. Meanwhile, the 50-million-album-selling band predicts that Ryan Newman will win, followed by Tony Stewart, Gordon, Johnson, Martin and Carl Edwards.
"McHenry is a chump," a Foreigner spokesperson said when reached for comment. "We've been done with him since we heard his opinions on tort reform."
"Whatever," McHenry shot back. "They are a bunch of corporate rock sellouts. I've been over them since 'Inside Information.'"
OK, no one actually said any of that. But since Kyle Busch's visit to the WWE last week, I've become a believer in mixing in some smack-talk here and there when the time feels right.
It's too late for any of the other celebs to catch McHenry or Foreigner, but there's a nice battle for third underway between John Ondrasik, aka Five For Fighting guy, and super-chef Emeril Lagasse.
When it comes to NASCAR Veterans Day stories, the tale of teenage Bud Moore -- a future NASCAR Hall of Famer if there ever was one -- hitting the beach at Normandy never gets old. On Wednesday we recalled it again.
Moore, who won 63 races and 43 poles as a team owner and crew chief, served in the European Theater. He survived perhaps the most brutal year ever endured by American armed forces, hitting Utah Beach on D-Day and moving inland to outlast the frozen forest of the Battle of the Bulge. Along the way, he earned two fistfuls of medals, and at one point he and a fellow soldier captured an entire platoon of Germans.
You think taking orders from Big Bill France was tough? Not after you've taken them from General George S. Patton.
On Wednesday night, "NASCAR Now" aired a great interview with Moore that was conducted by my ESPN.com colleague Ed Hinton. You can see it here. After the story aired, I came on the show to talk about Moore, along with former NASCAR champ turned ESPN analyst Rusty Wallace. "NASCAR Now" host Mike Massaro asked me to recall a Moore memory, and it didn't take me long to think of one.
It was during the 1998 season, NASCAR's 50th anniversary celebration, and I was a still-young producer for the late, great "RPM 2Night." My Bud Moore introduction was made by Tom Higgins of the Charlotte Observer, no less than the greatest NASCAR writer who has strolled through the Cup garage. No sooner than I had sat down, Moore asked for a favor. I was startled. What could he possibly want from me?
"Your career is just getting going," he said, pointedly. "When you are writing about sports or producing television about sports, please do me a favor and get rid of the war clichés. You know, 'the race was a war, it was life or death,' all that stuff. There's nothing like war but war. And anyone who has ever been stuck in the middle of a real war knows that no ballgame or race should ever be likened to that. Never."
In the 11 years since, I can't honestly say that I am batting 1.000 fulfilling Moore's request, but I have certainly tried. And rarely have I slipped behind a keyboard or into an edit suite without remembering what he said to me.
Give us Moore
Speaking of Higgins, no sports writer has spent more time at or away from the track with Moore than Pap has. Their friendship has lasted so long and runs so deep that the two men sat together at the NASCAR Hall of Fame announcement last month, ending a day when they also had served together as members of the 25-person voting panel.
Because of that friendship, Higgins writes about Moore like no other. Here's a sampling:
• Moore's video bio that was posted by NASCAR after he was announced as a candidate for the Hall of Fame's first class.
Speed mail
Dear Ryan,
I thoroughly enjoyed Carl Edwards's visit to "The Price Is Right" on Tuesday morning. You were right, he is too smooth. I also enjoyed NASCAR week on "Are You Smarter Than A 5th Grader?" Is this the first time that NASCAR racers have made the game show circuit?
Bobby Thompson
Surprise, Ariz.
Bobby,
No sir, racers have been taking cracks at televised games, quizzes and spinning wheels for decades from "Wheel Of Fortune" to "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?" Jeff Gordon made the "Millionaire" appearance, thudding out at $32,000. He was handed a pop music question to which the answer was Billy Joel. He phoned a friend, another Charlotte Observer writer, David Poole, who was no help. It's been eight years, and Gordon still gets ribbed about his early exit. The earliest game show appearance by a racer that I know of is A.J. Foyt's appearance on CBS' "I've Got A Secret" the week after his 1961 Indy 500 win. Believe it or not, there's video of it on YouTube. And is it just me, or does former Miss America Bess Myerson seem to be a little taken with Super Tex?
Dear Ryan,
You have long been a proponent of shortening Sprint Cup races, have you not? So, will you be on your usual high horse this weekend during the Subway Fresh 500 at Phoenix?
Torin
Tempe, Ariz.
Torin,
No! Yes, I will be raising heck about 500-mile races (you know me well, Torin), but not in the manner you're expecting. Phoenix is actually one of the tracks that has long understood that NASCAR's obsession with the number 500 is unhealthy. Yes, the Phoenix race has "500" in the title, but they are 500 kilometers, not miles. It's the perfect solution. The track gets to cling to the romanticism of the five-bill number, but they don't make us endure a four-plus-hour race because of it. The IndyCar Series also has gone the silent "K" route for a while now with the exception of, obviously, the Indianapolis 500.
Yo Ryan,
I liked your look at the stock car up-and-comers that ran the ARCA season finale at Rockingham in October. Any updates?
Spicoli in Ridgemont
Hi Jeff, Mr. Hand would like to see you after class ...
There is a big development, and it has happened just this week. Justin Lofton, who won the ARCA title that day at The Rock, apparently really impressed those Toyota talent scouts that I wrote about. Lofton just signed on with Red Horse Racing's NASCAR Truck Series for 2010. He was one of the few young guys without a pre-existing development deal with a big Cup team. Looks like that's changing.
He's as big as Bat Boy. As large (metaphorically) as Dr. Phil. And as huge as Brangelina.
Don't believe me? Fine, let's ask Walt the teenage grocery clerk. You see, one of Walt's many jobs at my local Food Lion in Charlotte, N.C., is to fill, arrange and keep watch over the store's multiple magazine racks and checkout-aisle newsstands.
Which means that this week Walt carefully stocked said racks with the following headlines:
National Enquirer: "Dale Earnhardt Jr. Emotional Breakdown" ... Crying, punching walls & more!
No, I am not making this up.
NASCAR's biggest star is on the cover of the grocery store's biggest tabloid, his photo framed between stories of J. Lo's half-naked video with her dancer ex-husband, Penny Marshall's -- of Laverne and Shirley fame -- brain surgery and Dr. Phil, whom sources say has only three years to live.
As of Tuesday, the online version of the story (read it for yourself here), which added the headline "Pal: Dale Jr. in a Death Spiral", was sandwiched between a story about Jessica Simpson's recent collapse and the details of a meeting between reality TV refugee Jon Gosselin and Sarah Palin's daughter's ex, Levi Johnston.
Again, let me repeat: I am not making this up.
According to the Enquirer's "sources," Junior is drinking himself into oblivion. At one point it tells the story of a "NASCAR writer shocked to hear that Dale was found alone, weeping, after a poor finish in a race." Rarely does one have the opportunity to read such fine third-hand he-said reporting.
Some of the details in the story are correct. He has dated at least a couple of the six women listed in the story and the pictures are actually of him and not of other people who merely resemble him.
But the writer tips his hand about halfway through the story, when he quotes his apparent source with this wordy gem: "On race days lately, when Dale should have been up and ready to win, he instead seemed listless, morose and disturbingly unfocused."
Shortly after we posted Tuesday's blog about the USAR revival of the North Wilkesboro Speedway, the actual announcement was made and another bomb was dropped.
The American Speed Association (ASA) -- the league that brought us Alan Kulwicki, Mark Martin and Rusty Wallace -- will run its prestigious King's Ransom 300 next fall at the newly revived track. The event will be moved to North Carolina thanks to the shuttering of the Memphis Motorsports Park. Dates are still to-be-determined.
Here are two great packages by two local TV stations in the Triad area about Tuesday's North Wilkesboro announcement. The first is from Fox affiliate WGHP and the second is from NBC partner WXII.
For Your Viewing Pleasure
And in case you missed Cousin Carl Edwards' Tuesday morning appearance on "The Price Is Right," as usual, we're here for you. Gentlemen, start your Showcase Showdowns.
Observation No. 1: Carl is so smooth it makes you sick.
Observation No. 2 : You know the image-conscious marketing suits down in Daytona cringed a little when TPIR rolled out the big prize in the first showcase -- a trailer.
But after glancing at its 2010 schedule, I'm thinking it might need Doc Brown's 1.21-gigawatt-powered machine before it drops the green flag on next season. Because the USAR is, with all apologies to Marty McFly, headed back to the future.
The series formerly known as Hooters Pro Cup will hold events at six deep-in-the-south racetracks that share more NASCAR history than any and every amenity-laden, 1.5-mile, modern cookie-cutter track you can pay $150 to get into. The crown jewel of the calendar will come Oct. 3, 2010, when Pro Cup cars take the green flag at the -- you might want to sit down for this -- North Wilkesboro Speedway. And yes, we're talking about the same NWS that has sat empty and rotting since Jeff Gordon won the final NASCAR Cup race there in 1996.
The unofficial announcement came when the USAR released its '10 schedule to competitors during its season finale weekend on Halloween. The official announcement is scheduled for Tuesday afternoon -- an open invitation to media, fans and local residents -- inviting all to wear whatever they had on at that last race in '96. The invite and instructions were sent to the Wilkes County community by one of their own, Terri Parsons, wife of the late racing hero (and Wilkesboro native) Benny Parsons.
The entire region, once soured on stock racing because it built the sport and then watched as the sport abandoned it, has a hop in its step once again. And it's all thanks to the largely unknown USAR.
"It's pretty cool isn't it?" newly crowned three-time series champ Clay Rogers said. "You walk into all these racetracks on the USAR schedule, and as a racer, you're just aching to add your name to the roll call of winners, because that list includes every legendary NASCAR champion you've ever heard of."
He means that quite literally.
Also on the 2010 USAR calendar will be:
• Gresham Motorsports Park (Georgia), March 27 & Oct. 23. This might very well be the finest short track in the country, built on the site of the old Jeffco/Peach State Speedway, which played host to two Cup Series events in 1968-69, won by Cale Yarborough and Bobby Isaac. Leeroy Yarborough, Wendell Scott and Alan Kulwicki all earned short track wins here on their way up the ladder. The track general manager is Dan Elliott, brother and former crew member of Awesome Bill.
• Hickory Motor Speedway (North Carolina), May 1. The .363-mile oval hosted 35 Sprint Cup races, the first won by Tim Flock in 1953 and the last won by Tiny Lund in 1971 in, get this, a Camaro. For years Hickory was owned and operated by local hero Ned Jarrett and it hosted the Nationwide Series until 1998.
• Rockingham Speedway (North Carolina), May 15. The Rock ran 78 Cup races, from Curtis Turner's emotional comeback win in '65 to Matt Kenseth's victory in 2004. Dale Earnhardt, Richard Petty, Cale Yarborough and Jeff Gordon all clinched championships there. The USAR has run Rockingham since it reopened in 2008. I wrote a feature for ESPN The Mag earlier this summer about the track's resurgence and its overwhelmingly positive effect on the community.
In addition, the USAR will visit Bristol Motor Speedway, aka Thunder Valley, as well as the Salem and Winchester Speedways in Indiana, grounds that are just as hallowed to open wheel devotees (Mario, A.J. and Tony Stewart all ran there) as Rockingham and Hickory are to NASCAR fans.
But the unmistakable crown jewel of 2010 will be the reopening of North Wilkesboro. Just two months ago, I openly bemoaned the sight of NASCAR's Titanic sitting there by U.S. Highway 421, rusting away before my very eyes. I, like so many others, held out hope that the old bullring, first built as a show palace for moonshining cars, would one day be reopened. But we all knew deep down that it probably wouldn't.
What we didn't know was that a group called Speedway Associates Incorporated has been working behind the scenes for months now. It received some wind in its sails thanks to a recent resurgence of fans wanting to know about North Wilkesboro. That fever was fueled by Junior Johnson's NASCAR Hall of Fame induction and the recent Moonshiners and Revenuers Reunion, hosted by Terri Parsons. I went to that magical event and wrote a column about it in the current issue of ESPN The Magazine.
Junior and Terri had both hinted to me that some news might be coming, but I had no idea it would be actual racing news.
"There's a lot of work to do up there," Johnson said to me a few years ago as we drove by the rust-covered Turn 1 grandstands. "There was a lot of stuff that got by over the years, sewer stuff and structural stuff that inspectors looked the other way on for years because it was our hometown track. That'll take some doing, but the racing surface has always been fixable. My son [aspiring teenage short tracker Robert] has been testing out there just this year."
Within the Wilkes County community, the hope is still laced with skepticism, even after Tuesday's announcement. Forgive them that. They've been hearing about various groups swooping in to save the track for years and nothing has ever happened. For more on the efforts to get the track ready for next fall, see this story in the Wilkes Journal-Patriot, which includes a promise from Mrs. Parsons to use Tuesday's news conference "to set the record straight as to what is going on."
Regardless of those plans, whether the North Wilkesboro Speedway is up and running full-time or simply throws its doors open once for the USAR and then closes for good, I beg of you now -- as do the ghosts of NASCAR's past -- please buy a ticket and show up. Not just to Wilkesboro, but Rockingham, Hickory, South Boston and all of the other once-proud Cup Series establishments that have been given a second lease on life.
If they have to shut The Rock and North Wilkesboro down again, we'll have no one to blame but ourselves. If they stay open, then we'll first thank USAR. And then Doc Brown.
Kurt Busch has had a very nice season. He's won two races, made the Chase and seems to be headed for a solid top-five points finish, which would be fitting because the 2004 Cup champ has spent nearly the entire '09 season in the top five.
On Sunday he grabbed his second win under the guidance of longtime crew chief Pat Tryson, who joined Penske Racing in 2007 and turned around the laboring No. 2 car made famous by Rusty Wallace. Tryson and Busch have won five races and made two Chases in less than three seasons together.
However, the Monday following the season finale at the Homestead-Miami Speedway, Tryson will be leaving Busch's team, departing to call the shots for Martin Truex Jr.'s new ride at Michael Waltrip Racing in 2010. The fact that he's leaving isn't a surprise, crew chiefs change jobs nearly as often as Major League Baseball managers or NFL coordinators. Truex will be Tryson's fourth driver in five seasons (Mark Martin and Greg Biffle preceded Busch). But the fact that he's managed to keep the team operating at a championship-caliber level despite his lame-duck status (Penske allows him to come into the office only one day a week, so as to not steal any secrets for 2010) is beyond unusual. It's unprecedented.
It is not, however, the most surprising crew chief move that we've ever seen in NASCAR. Some of the biggest names in the history of wrench handlers have grabbed their toolbox and headed for the door in the middle of successful seasons, careers and even in Victory Lane.
Which ones are the most memorable? I had a feeling you might ask.
5. Suitcase Jake Elder leaves Osterlund and Earnhardt: 1980
They did call him "Suitcase" Jake Elder after all. So no one should have been surprised when the veteran crew chief suddenly up and bolted Osterlund Racing just shy of halfway through the 1980 season. But the No. 2 Chevy had the points lead and second-year racer Dale Earnhardt had already won two races and was showing no signs of wilting in the face of a season-long battle with Richard Petty and Cale Yarborough for the Winston Cup title. So, why leave?
After a falling-out with the dictator-like Osterlund and increasing wariness over daily run-ins with team manager Roland Wlodyka, Elder packed up the inspiration for his nickname and headed out the door. After knocking around for a while, he landed with Robert Yates Racing. The team found itself led by just-turned 20-year-old Doug Richert and ended up winning the Cup title over Yarborough.
4. Larry McReynolds leaves Yates for Childress: 1997
Elder hung around at RYR until 1991, when he was replaced by a very young and very intense Alabama mechanic named Larry McReynolds, who had just served a term as crew chief for Ricky Rudd with drag racing legend Kenny Bernstein's NASCAR team.
From the moment he walked in the door, Larry Mac hit it off with fellow Alabaman Davey Allison. From the get-go the No. 28 Ford was a title contender. They won 11 races, including two All-Star events and the '92 Daytona 500. McReynolds was the emotional and mechanical leader for two team comebacks, the first after the death of Allison in '92 and the second after Ernie Irvan's near-death experience in '94.
So, it came as a huge shock when McReynolds went to the Yates family, whom he openly referred to as his own family, and told them he was leaving at the end of the '96 season. "There was only one job I would have left Yates for," McReynolds says now. "That was to work with Dale Earnhardt."
Larry Mac was brought in to add the one jewel missing in The Intimidator's crown -- winning the Daytona 500. They did that in '98, but the rest of the marriage was a bit of a mess. After a season and a half of not being on the same page, McReynolds left to be crew chief for Earnhardt's teammate, Mike Skinner, halfway through the '98 season. In 2001 he became an analyst for Fox.
3. Waddell Wilson leaves Ranier for Hendrick: 1987
Everywhere Waddell Wilson went, he made some serious horsepower. He started in the legendary engine room of the Charlotte-based Holman and Moody race team, where he worked alongside fellow youngsters Elder and Yates. Then he did stints with L.G. DeWitt's '73 Cup-winning team and Ranier Racing. At Ranier, he played the dual role of engine builder and crew chief, building a superspeedway car for Buddy Baker that was so scary the competition called it "The Gray Ghost" because it seemed to leap up out of the asphalt and devour opponents.
Then, like Larry Mac, he received an offer he couldn't refuse. In 1987, Darrell Waltrip stunned the garage by abandoning Junior Johnson's team to join Hendrick Motorsports. DW called Waddell and convinced him to come along as well, forming the so-called "Dream Team."
"It wasn't so much of a dream as just a really nice run," Waltrip says of the four-year marriage. "We won some races [9] and I finally won the Daytona 500. But I think the best we finished in points was fourth. I got hurt in 1990 and left to start our own team in '91. I love Waddell, he's like my brother, but that deal never worked out like we wanted it to."
Hendrick had hoped the Dream Team would finally lead him to his first Cup title. It wouldn't come until 1995 with Jeff Gordon and crew chief Ray Evernham.
2. Ray Evernham leaves Hendrick for himself: 1999
During the 1999 season Evernham decided that he needed a new challenge. As Jeff Gordon's crew chief he'd won three of the previous four titles and 47 races, including that year's season-opening Daytona 500. Somewhere in the middle of it all he had been contacted by Chrysler, which was desperate to re-enter the Dodge nameplate into NASCAR after a two-decade absence. They knew he'd dreamed of owning his own team and wanted to talk about helping him do that.
As the '99 season ground on, his future plans became obvious and were a distraction. So after the season's 27th race, he stepped down as leader of the Rainbow Warriors and left Hendrick Motorsports for the newly formed Evernham Motorsports.
Gordon won the next two races with interim crew chief Brian Whitesell and added his fourth Cup in 2001, but hasn't won one since. Evernham won 13 races as a team owner, including the 2002 Brickyard 400 with Bill Elliott and a six-win '06 season with Kasey Kahne. But he sold his operation to billionaire George Gillett in 2007 and shortly afterward found himself on the outside looking in. Now an analyst with ESPN and short track operator, Evernham has expressed a desire to become a team consultant or perhaps even crew chief again, but the terms of his buyout won't allow it.
1. Dale Inman leaves Petty for Osterlund: 1981
Whenever a crew chief and driver hit it off, they like to say, "We're a family."
Dale Inman and Richard Petty actually were. The cousins have known one another their entire lives. As kids, Inman made the mechanical decisions that allowed Petty to have the fastest downhill bicycle in Randleman, N.C. As adults, he called the shots that led to 192 of The King's record 200 victories. Why not all 200?
"Well, his daddy [Lee] gets credit for one of them," Inman said on the other end of one of his legendarily strong handshakes. "And the rest came after I left."
The pair won their seventh Cup together in 1979 with a stirring come-from-behind victory over Waltrip. But the wins weren't coming in bunches anymore. Inman had long coveted the idea of going to another team to prove that he could win without his famous cuz. So after making a gutsy "gas-only" call that won the 1981 Daytona 500 -- their seventh -- Inman announced in Victory Lane that he was leaving the team. "It didn't have anything to do with bad luck or bad feelings," Petty said at the time. "Dale just felt it was time for a change."
He first went to Osterlund Racing to work with Earnhardt, but by the summer of '80 that team was in disarray and Earnhardt was gone. In 1983 Inman joined car owner Billy Hagan and young Texas racer Terry Labonte. One year later the No. 44 Piedmont Airlines Chevy won the Winston Cup title. Inman, still the only crew chief with eight championship rings, had proved his point.
Without Inman, Petty won seven more times, including his fabled 200th win in '84, but that would end up being his last victory. The two reunited in '86, returning home to try to rebuild the once-mighty Petty Enterprises.
Once again, it's time to get deep inside the numbers of the Chase racers as they approach their upcoming track, in this case the super-fast, 1.5-mile Texas Motor Speedway.
You know, we used to preface every Texas race by talking about Jeff Gordon's career-long struggle there and we'd crow about how it was one of only two NASCAR tracks where he hadn't visited Victory Lane. So what did he do during our last visit there in April?
He visited Victory Lane. (His last remaining oh-fer track? Homestead-Miami, home of the season finale.)
As always, I rank the 12 Chasers in the order of who I think has the best chance of winning this weekend, based on their career numbers at TMS, recent momentum and how they ran in the spring. Two immediate observations: (1) It's amazing how many different Chasers have won there; (2) It's even more amazing how bad the average finishes are for so many of those winners. Current points rankings are in parentheses.
* Samsung 500, won by Jeff Gordon
** Driver Rating has been compiled by NASCAR since 2005
Speed Mail
Dear Ryan,
I know everyone is sick of talking about Talladega, but I can't shake the image of all those cars snaking around in a single-file line up by the wall for what seemed like hours. Is that the most boring Talladega or Daytona race we've ever seen?
Thanks,
Jack J. in Kansas City, Kan.
Dear Jack J.,
Yes, I have seen plenty of superspeedway races that were worse than the oft-maligned Amp Energy 500. The first that comes to mind is the 2000 Daytona 500, which was victimized by some restrictor-plate changes and aero-tinkering. Dale Jarrett won from the pole and led 89 of 200 laps. We had (yawn) nine lead changes, most of which came during pit stops, and the race ended under caution. Holy snoozefest. How bad was it? Ask Dale Earnhardt. I felt sorry for Jarrett, who had to spend his national media tour apologizing for the race being so bad. These days, fan sentiments get magnified because of the Internet, which a much smaller percentage of people had access to 10 years ago. There were a few message boards, but no one had heard of a blog, Twitter was still years away and there certainly wasn't a 24-hour NASCAR radio channel for people to call and raise hell on all day and night. One day in the not-too -distant future, when talking about Talladega people will remember only Ryan Newman's flip and Jimmie Johnson's title-clinching run from the back. At least I hope so ... I'm tired of talking about it.
Dear Ryan,
Settle a bet between me and my father-in-law. We know you're a Petty fan like us. He says that Kyle Petty's first career Cup win came at Daytona, when he was a rookie. I say he's remembering it wrong and that the Daytona win he's thinking about was in a Busch Series race. We have a month of free race-day pizzas riding on this.
Luke in Wilmington, N.C.
Dear Luke,
First, does he ever look at you and say in a deep voice, "Luke ... I am your father ... in-law"? Second, you're still going to be splitting the pizza bill because you're both wrong. Kyle and his mustache did earn their first career stock car win at Daytona, but it wasn't a Cup or Busch Series race. It was an ARCA race held during Daytona Speedweeks in 1979. He was a teenager, had just gotten married, and he and Pattie Petty celebrated their honeymoon by rooming with the family at Daytona Beach and competing in his first stock car race ever. His first Cup win wouldn't come until years later. Remember the famous "Battle of Richmond" closing-laps wreck between Dale Earnhardt and Darrell Waltrip in '86? Few remember who actually won the race after they crashed out. It was Kyle Petty. See the finish here. And here's how the story is remembered, by the greatest NASCAR writer to walk the surface of this planet, Tom Higgins.
The "Why We Call Richard Petty 'The King' " Fact Of The Week
His Royal Fastness retired five years before the Texas Motor Speedway opened, but that doesn't mean he didn't ride roughshod over the Lone Star State.
The 2-mile Texas World Speedway in College Station hosted eight Cup Series events between 1969 and '80. Petty won three of them, which was three times the number of his next closest competition. A bum clutch relegated him to a 21st-place DNF in '69, but his average finish for the remaining seven was a super-cool 2.6. Even with the DNF factored in, his career average of 4.9 is still tops all-time at the track, which still exists, though only as a test facility.
Ryan McGee
Ryan McGee is a senior writer with ESPN The Magazine. He started with ESPN
in 1994 working on the production staff of the show "RPM2Night,"during which
time he began contributing to The Mag. From 2001-03 he produced "Totally
NASCAR" on FOX Sports Net and for five years served as editor in chief at
NASCAR Media Group, winning two Sports Emmys and penning the script for the
documentary film "Dale".
Ryan McGee
