Appeal Denied As Expected
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[/media-credit]It must have been a full moon. I didn’t go because it’s a long way from West Virginia to the R&D Center and mostly because I knew what the verdict was before they announced it. Rarely does the NASCAR Appeal Board, or whatever they call it these days, overturn anything, especially when the defendants are caught red-handed. The circus continued regardless.
Reports I heard said reporters arrived at the designated place as early as 7:00 AM. When it got past noon, people bought food for the reporters, with Landon Cassill bringing Burger King (his sponsor) bringing treats to the faithful. Later on Lugnut, the Charlotte Motor Speedway mascot showed up to entertain. Never in the history of a hearing was so much done for so many. In the end, the penalty to Chad Knaus and the No. 48 team stayed the same, just as I expected. Rick Hendrick declared his disbelief at the verdict and vowed to take it to the next level. In the meantime, if the hearing with the head man is taken next week, it means Knaus would miss Fontana through Talladega, but the big issue is whether or not it would make a difference in the team.
Knaus would be able to set up the car, discuss changes to the car through cellular phone conversations, and everyone knows the team is so talented, it really won’t make a difference—not much anyway. The big issue is the points penalty. There is not a chance in hades that that will go away, so you have to wonder what in the world Rick Hendrick is thinking. The best that can happen, if history is any indication (and many think that the fact that the head officer is a former GM employee think this is probably what will happen), is a reduction of the suspensions of Knaus and the car chief. Why drag this out? Only Rick, the top owner in the series, knows. The penalty could be reduced, but it’s not likely, and it probably doesn’t matter anyway. The No. 48 team will make up the deficit, land in the top 10 and do its usual thing in the Chase. And yet, it was made into a circus maybe because it was Rick Hendrick and the five-time champ. Or maybe it was because it was an event and NASCAR has never avoided an event. We will know soon what the verdict is, but why all the drama?
Finally, Chevrolet kind of announced today that they won’t show their stock car for 2013 until later. Ford and Dodge, even though Dodge doesn’t know who will be campaigning the car, have already shown their car. Toyota and Chevrolet have not. Chevrolet said it will be a new nameplate—many think it will be the new Chevelle, built in Australia by Holden. I have to wonder how red-blooded American fans will react to their favorite, Dale Earnhardt, Jr., and other Chevy drivers driving a foreign car. It probably won’t make any difference. Fusions are made in Mexico and many Chargers are made in Canada. If they indeed run the Chevelle, people will accept the foreign car just like they did the Camry.
So, we’re not even at midweek and everyone’s all excited. In a couple of days, we head to Bristol, once the highlight of March. The change in the track configuration has lessened that some, but still a great to watch a race. Chad will be on the pit box for now and Trevor Bayne will not be there at his home track, but I have to hope that the circus over one team will not take away from the others and we see a great race. It’s going to be a tough act to follow, you know. I mean, Lugnut and a horde of reporters are hard to beat. But, for now, we have a race to win and the lawyers and protests are in the background. Until next week.
The Final Word – Tony was a tiger at Las Vegas, Petty was a tiger on SPEED
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[/media-credit]When the dust had cleared at Las Vegas, Sunday had featured two folks in my opinion. One was Tony Stewart, who won this early in the season way back in…well, never. He drove like a demon to take his one, beating his own standard when he claimed Atlanta in 2002, the fourth race of that campaign. Stewart has finished second at the Daytona 500, but no wins have ever come his way this early.
The defending and three-time NASCAR Cup king is now in his 13th full season on the tour, but like an old bear he just doesn’t shake off his hibernation until winter is gone and spring has pretty much passed. He has now won just twice in March, once in April (2006 – Martinsville), and twice in May, back to back at Richmond in 2001 and 2002. Twenty-one of his 45 victories have come in the middle third of the year, with 19 coming down the stretch. Maybe his competitors need to sing some sweet lullabies to Tony, put him back into his slumber until June. An early rising Stewart can’t be good for any of them.
There was another fellow who made some news on Sunday. If NASCAR had their way, their kangaroo court might just fine this boy (secretly, of course) $100,000 for telling it like it is. Kyle Petty had a few choice words to say in regards to the appeal system Chad Knaus and Jimmie Johnson are presently involved in. To tell you the truth, he made it sound a lot like the courtroom of Judge Roy Bean, the Law West of the Pecos.
If you don’t know about Bean, he was a man who shot another down, dueled another to the death, survived a lynching, and operated some saloons. Obviously a prime candidate to become Justice of the Peace in west Texas in the 1880s. Many a time the fines he handed out equaled the exact amount the accused happened to have had in their pockets. He was not empowered to grant divorces, but did so anyway while concluding wedding ceremonies with “and may God have mercy on your souls”, the traditional comment when handing out a death sentence. In short, Roy Bean made up the law as he went along, with little or no expertise in how to get it right.
That brings us back to Kyle Petty’s comments about those listed in the rule book as NASCAR’s 45 member appeals board. Three of them were picked, and decided that the Johnson-Knaus penalties were hunky dory. Due process? Well, maybe not. “Some of them may have passed away since their names were put in here. That’s how old these people are”, observed Petty. Maybe only a third of them had even been to a track in the past year, he furthered, do not have the expertise, and certainly could not be considered as the peers of those current drivers, team members, or owners. Or, as Petty stated, “These people don’t go to the racetrack, they don’t understand the process. They don’t understand sometimes where this sport is.”
By the way, Kyle also stated that the 25 point penalty handed out was no where near legitimate, in his opinion. Remember, the car in question had passed the templates before and, from what I understand, was not even going through the process when tagged using the ole eyeball method. It simply was at the track, but not yet presented for competition. In short, it had the same standing at that time as a Winnebago parked in the infield or a hot dog stand in the parking lot ; it was just there.
So, after Tuesday’s ruling Hendrick Motorsports takes this to NASCAR’s chief appellate officer to continue its appeal, all the while being very respectful to the powers that be. With his runner up finish at Las Vegas, Johnson sits 36 points out of a Chase place with 23 races to go before the deadline. That is doable, but it would be tougher should his crew chief, along with car chief Ron Malec, get an enforced six week holiday.
What about Kyle Petty? If NASCAR can fine independent contractors for making statements that they deem to be detrimental to stock car racing, what about an announcer? If they did, I don’t imagine Petty would find any support on the appeals board, unless the old fossils couldn’t remember what it was all about by the time they met.
What Petty said at Las Vegas had little to do as to whether the penalties were right or wrong, though we know what he thinks on that. It was about whether the appeal process constitutes a peer review of the issue or instead that they might be perceived as being just a rubber stamp committee of glorified hacks with little expertise who are less interested in doing what is right but rather doing what they are told. It should make for an interesting week as we lead up to Bristol.
Dale Earnhardt Jr. knows it was a good weekend but still leaves Vegas frustrated
[media-credit name=”Ed Coombs” align=”alignright” width=”238″]
[/media-credit]For a few hours on Sunday driver of the No. 88 National Guard Chevrolet looked the best he’s been the last three years.
Dale Earnhardt Jr. rocketed from the outside of the front row to take the lead and drove away from the field by over five seconds. He led until lap 44 when he came down pit road, but a caution falling the right way gave him back the lead until lap 74 when he surrendered it for good after leading for 70 total laps.
Earnhardt Jr. went on to finish 10th, his second top 10 of the season. He sits fourth in points entering Bristol this weekend.
“Well, we didn’t keep up with the race track,” said Earnhardt Jr. on his finish. “The car was really fast at the start of the race. I didn’t give that information to Steve [Letarte, crew chief]. I don’t think I gave him a good enough understanding of where our racecar was, even though it was really fast.
“The track got really tight on us at the end of the race. Something that I should have had a handle on, and should have known better, and should have not let happen. We just didn’t have our adjustments going throughout the day to keep up with the track as it tightened up on us.”
For as hard on himself as he was about where they finished, Earnhardt Jr. was very pleased with the fast car that his team had given him. It was fast right off the truck on Friday, near the top of every speed chart in practice and qualified fourth, it just didn’t finish where it deserved.
“Hopefully we can keep bringing cars like that to the racetrack and we will get some opportunities to win,” Earnhardt Jr. said. “We had good speed, led some laps. This is a tough series. When you get back in traffic it gets very competitive. Congratulations to Tony [Stewart] and his team. We’ll be at it in Bristol trying to get another one.”
The finish falls squarely on Earnhardt Jr.’s shoulders, at least according to him. Repeatedly saying after the race that he didn’t give Letarte enough or the right information to make changes to his car. And he didn’t think far enough ahead in the race to predict what the car or track would do.
That fault of Earnhardt Jr.’s cost the team on a weekend when they had one of the best cars on the track. And it’s something that he’s been publicly criticized for in the past.
As Sunday’s race started to wind down and cautions started to fall Earnhardt Jr. knew that his car was going to get tight and it would make the job of navigating traffic that much harder. It was too late though for changes to be made and he had to do the best he can with what box he had put himself in.
Once he lost the lead Earnhardt Jr. never cracked the top five for the remainder of the race. Instead he fought to remain inside the top 10 where he eventually finished. Yet, it was a former teammate of his who gave him unexpected trouble and halted the hard charge he was trying to make at the end.
Earnhardt Jr. was running 10th and coming with a full head of steam off turn two when Mark Martin, running ninth, remained next to the wall instead of moving to the inside.
It would have give Earnhardt Jr. a clear lane to drive by but instead he was knocked in the rear end by an upset Earnhardt Jr. The contact sent Martin into the backstretch wall, damaging the right side of his No. 55.
“Personally, I don’t have a problem with Mark and have so respect for him,” said Earnhardt Jr. “But to me, there is an unwritten etiquette that when the guy is running the top, even if you are clearing him or passing him, I’m coming 10 miles an hour faster off the top of the race track, you stay low.
“Don’t knock a half second off my lap time by being a jerk about it. Stay low. You are going to get it in the next corner and the position is going to be yours. Don’t pull up in front of somebody when they are going to come off the corner 10 miles an hour faster.”
Though he did apologize for damaging Martin’s car, Earnhardt Jr. said he was already frustrated at that point in the race and Martin sent him over the edge. Still looking to snap his 132 race, over three year, winless streak, Earnhardt Jr. is hungrier than ever and he’s ready for more than a solid weekend.
“We just wan to win really bad and felt like we should have finished better than we did,” he said. “I was just frustrated at that point and that is just not the way that I understand it to be done and I am sure he feels a different way about it but I think we definitely disagreed right there at that moment.”
Ty Dillon Puts Pressure Aside, Looking To Do Well This Year
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[/media-credit]For any driver entering into the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series driving for one of the biggest teams in NASCAR, Richard Childress Racing, the pressure is certainly there to perform. However, for Ty Dillon, the pressure goes beyond that. But as you take a closer look at this 19-year-old, the pressure isn’t bugging him one bit.
For starters, he is driving the exact same truck that his brother Austin Dillon drove to the 2011 NASCAR Camping World Truck Series Championship. Everybody is expecting younger brother Ty to live up to Austin’s level after Ty finished in the top 10 in two of three starts last year.
Rather than being concerned with the expectations, Ty Dillon focuses on the advantages of having a big brother racing in NASCAR.
“I can use his career as a learning curve for me, the things that he does,” Dillon says. “I get to pay attention to everything that he does on and off the race track that help him or hurt him. There are a lot of advantages to having an older brother who is successful in a series above you.”
Dillon also has the pressure on his shoulders as he is the grandson of his team owner, Childress. For Dillon, he once again uses it as an advantage from his standpoint in his career.
“He is always there to help us, no matter what it is on or off the race track,” the defending ARCA Racing Series Champion says. “Whether it’s doing stuff like this and what he’s learned over the years that’s helped him, or things on the race track. He’s a legend of our sport and I’m very blessed to be in the situation that I am to be able to rely on him.”
Dillon adds that Childress stresses that he should bring the truck back in one piece, while also taking some risks to win races.
At no point does Dillon take for granted the situation he is in, either, saying that he was blessed to be born into this situation.
“I’ve been around racing all my life and kind of knew it would be an option there for me,” he says. “My grandfather never really wanted to pressure us into racing. We played football, baseball and other sports. We kind of started racing late. I started when I was 13. (Brother) Austin was 15. Nowadays kids are starting when they’re four or five years old racing.”
Since then, the feeling behind the wheel hasn’t changed for Dillon as he says he still loves it just as much.
“Driving, it just gives us that feeling that you can’t get away from,” he explains. “We still get it every day when we strap into these Nationwide (cars) and trucks and we race probably 50 or 60 races a year, just because we love the sport and we love what we do.”
With taking over the truck that his big brother drove, that means that Dillon is behind the wheel of the legendary No. 3 truck. This brings its own set of expectations from fans that expect the No. 3 to be running up front and winning every weekend. Dillon says he doesn’t feel that pressure as he is actually having fun with running the number.
“It means more to us on a personal side that it’s my grandfather’s number and it’s really great to see the fan’s reactions when you run well in it and you win races,” he says. “To see how excited people get to see that black number 3 back there on the track, the way it used to be. So we’re just having fun with it right now. As long as everybody stays happy with it that’s what we’re going do. As far as what series it’s going to go, I’ll leave that up to my grandfather. Right now we’re doing it for our family and doing it for the fans.”
In expanding on that, Dillon says that the number means a lot to him due to it being the number that his grandfather Childress ran during his career.
Dillon joins the youth movement that has taken over the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series as late with young drivers coming in to get their start in racing, including James Buescher and Parker Kligermann, among others.
“They kind of got away from having individual names that led that series,” Dillon says. “Now we’ve got young guys in each series that are developing their way from the trucks to the Nationwide and now to Sprint Cup. It’s really cool to see that and gives you hope as a driver making your way up the rankings. I’m glad to see more individuality in each series, so it’s really nice.”
While most rookies may be set on coming in and learning, that’s not the same with Dillon. He says that coming off the ARCA championship last year and driving Austin’s trucks, he feels that he can do well.
“I feel like we need to run for a championship this year,” he says. “We’ve got the experience and the equipment, why can’t we do it? We ran well last year and we got a lot of confidence going into this year. We’ll see what it gives us. We want to win some races but our main trophy in our little trophy case we have set off to the side is the championship trophy. Then if we do that, we will have won races and won rookie of the year.”
So far, Dillon is off to a pretty good start as he survived the carnage in Daytona to finish ninth and now sits eighth in points heading into Martinsville in two weeks.
