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HOUSTON DAILY JOURNAL
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The law west
of the Poconos
Carl Edwards, who had been
third In the Chase the previous
year, never recovered from the
second Pocono race, when he
was apparently the unwitting vic
tim of Tony Stewart's anger.
Early in the race. Edwards
was watching Stewart and rookie
Clint Bowyer warily, the field hav
ing been bunched up by one of
those delightful NASCAR inven
tions. the “competition caution.”
What followed the caution defi
nitely wasn’t cautious. TV replays
showed Stewart shaking his fist
at Bowyer even as he drove his
car into the side of Bowyer's.
Naturally, the car damaged most
severely was Edwards' Ford,
which had nowhere to go when
the firebrands in front wrecked
each other.
After repairs had been made.
Edwards returned to the race
many laps down. During a yellow
flag, he drove up alongside Stew
art on the back straight and
raised both hands, palms open,
conveying the "What were you
thinking?" message, Stewart's
reply? Another well-known ges
ture involving the same digit on
both hands. As the two drove
down pit road on lap 67, Ed
wards rammed Stewart's car.
If there's any consolation,
though, Carl, Tony didn't make
the Chase either.
Say what?
Early in the season, a re
porter asked Denny Hamlin, who
would go on to be Rookie of the
Year and finish third in the
Chase, if it was difficult to inter
act with teammates Stewart and
J.J. Yeley. Hamlin, from Chester
field. Va., grew up racing stock
cars; his teammates graduated
from the sprint cars and
midgets.
"Well," said Hamlin, “I think
those guys learned a lot of car
control that helps them a lot.
But, I think, what can be the
equalizing factor for a guy in
stock cars like me is running on
dirt tracks.”
“I'm sorry," said the reporter.
“I didn't realize you raced on dirt
tracks when you were getting
started."
“I never drove on a dirt track
in my life,” replied Hamlin.
Said by Said
After being spun out from be
hind by Reed Sorenson's Dodge
at Indianapolis, Boris Said's ex
planation was: “It was just one of
those racing deals where he was
doing his deal and I was doing my
deal, and our deals ended up col
liding, so it's a bad day for me."
There is, however, no truth to
the rumor that Sorenson replied
by telling Said: “Deal with it.”
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Trivia time
Questions
1. Halfway through the 2006
Chase for the Nextel Cup, who
was the leader?
2. Who won more races during
the Chase than any other driver?
3. How many men have won at
least one championship in the
history of NASCAR's premier
series, now known as Nextel
Cup?
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■ "Racing is what I do for fun.
I’ve got to be honest. Golf's a
cool sport, but if I’m going to go
out and do something, I’d rather
go racing." Robby Gordon
■ "I don't know nothing about
nothing, but what I know about, I
know.' Mark Martin
■ ‘lf these fans are going
crazy in the stands, these guys
in the cars will be on each oth
er’s asses.” wrestler Hulk
Hogan, grand marshal at Dover.
■ “You’ve got to understand
that the totem pole on our team
is horizontal. It's not vertical.”
owner Chip Ganassi, failing to re
alize that a totem pole can't pos
sibly be horizontal.
■ “I felt like Rocky Balboa in
the 15th round." Boris Said,
after finishing fourth in the Pepsi
400 at Daytona.
■ “Race-car driving is a little
like sex. All men think they’re
good at it. So when you're out
there by yourself, you're actually
good at it until somebody else
comes on the track.” talk
show host Jay Leno, after driving
the pace car at the Daytona 500.
► If you have a question or a comment, write: NASCAR This Week, c/o The Gaston Gazette, RO. Box 1538, Gastonia, NC 28053
Harvick’s 'moonlighting' further proof of his racing skills
Kevin Harvick won the Busch Series cham
pionship and finished fourth in the Nextel Cup
points standings in 2006.
That's quite a season's work. What's more,
Harvick won his second Busch championship
by the widest margin. 824 points, in history. He
won nine races, one shy of Sam Ard's 1983
record, and piled up 32 finishes in the top 10.
There were only 35 races altogether. Nothing
can undermine that remarkable level of consis
tency.
In terms of Harvick's performance, the
biggest complaint about the current status of
the Busch Series is invalid. Many observers
consider it a bit unfair for Cup regulars to com
pete full time in the Busch Series, as well. It's
kind of like the St. Louis Cardinals winning
Chasing Favorites
Picking favorites for
next year’s Chase
pretty tough to do
By Monte Dutton
NASCAR This Week
■ Soon, previews will begin appear
ing with predictions regarding the
2007 season. Foremost among them
will be the issue of which drivers will
make the Chase for the Nextel Cup.
■ Four drivers who failed to make
the Chase in 2007 two-time champi
on Tony Stewart, ex-champ Kurt
Busch, Greg Biffle and Carl Edwards
will undoubtedly be carefully con
sidered as contenders to return to the
elite field.
■ If those four make it, who doesn’t?
The 10 Chase drivers from the past
season were, in order of finish, Jimmie
Johnson, Matt Kenseth, Denny Hamlin,
Kevin Harvick, Dale Earnhardt Jr.,
Jeff Gordon, Jeff Burton, Kasey
Kahne, Mark Martin and Kyle Busch.
■ One obvious opening will occur be
cause Martin is no longer scheduled to
compete full time in Cup.
■ Another item of interest will be the
performances of Casey Mears, who is
moving to Hendrick Motorsports, and
Brian Vickers, who will move to Toy
ota’s Team Red Bull. Those two were
14 th (Mears) and 15 th in the 2006 stand
ings.
■ What of Ryan Newman, who made
the Chase in 2004-05? And Clint
Bowyer, who had a solid rookie season
at Richard Childress Racing? Another
upwardly mobile driver might be Scott
Riggs, who finished 20 th in the 2006
standings.
■ Edwards figures to be the favorite
for the Busch Series championship. He
was runner-up to Harvick, who won’t
compete full time in the series next
year. At present, the only other Cup
Parsons hampered by additional health issues
By Monte Dutton
NASCAR This Week
Benny Parsons, the 1973
Winston Cup champion and
longtime television analyst, has
suffered additional health set
backs in the wake of treatment
for lung cancer.
The 65-year-old Parsons re
ported that he was having trou
ble breathing. A body scan re
vealed no cancer, but the radia
tion treatments necessary to
eradicate the growths caused
irreparable damage to his left
lung. The tumor there had been
so large that the radiation
treatment was more than the
lung could withstand.
Parsons’ right lung is healthy
and strong, and doctors hope
that, with time, he will be able
to adjust to breathing with one
lung. For now, however, he re
quires constant oxygen,
through a breathing apparatus,
to function.
.■
Busch Series sponsor
Clint Bowyer, entering his sec-
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Harvick
J.J. Yeley, Kyle Busch, Greg Biffle and Reed
Sorenson, not to mention the two Busch Series
"specialists," Paul Menard and Johnny Sauter,
who also finished in the top 10.
The ranks of the full-time “moonlighters"
I hate the term “Busch-whackers" will be
BURNING ISSUES ]
John Clark/NASCAR This Week
Dale Earnhardt Jr. leads a group of cars down the front stretch in Daytona. How the
contenders next season will line up Is anyone’s guess.
drivers planning to compete full time
in Busch, as well, are Dave Blaney and
David Ragan.
■ Toyota’s entry in Cup will be
watched closely. The Japanese manu
facturer's performance in the Crafts
man Truck Series improved each year,
culminating in Todd Bodine's champi
onship and a runaway victory for Toy
ota in the series’ manufacturer stand
ings. If Toyota used trucks as a model
for its Cup participation, the plan suc
ceeded.
■ The coming season will be partic
ularly taxing to Cup teams, thanks to
ond year in Nex
tel Cup, will no
longer compete
full time in the
Busch Series,
but he will have
BB&T Corpora
tion as primary
sponsor for 17
Bowver
Busch races during the next
two seasons.
BB&T, based in Winston-
Salem, N.C., operates more
than 1,450 financial centers in
the Carolinas, Virginia, Mary
land, West Virginia, Kentucky,
Tennessee, Georgia, Florida,
Alabama, Indiana and the Dis
trict of Columbia.
Bowyer, from Emporia, Kan.,
has won three times in 87
Busch Series starts. In Cup,
Bowyer, 27, had four top-five
and 11 top-10 finishes during
his rookie season in Richard
Childress Racing’s No. 07
Chevrolet.
■
On a dare Truck Series
driver Brendan Gaughan re
cently completed a half
SPORTS
IN THE SPOTLIGHT
both the World Series and the
International League.
In Harvick’s case, howev
er, it can't be said that he
won the title against inferior
competition. Eight Cup driv
ers finished in the top 10. He
and his Richard Childress
Racing team had to outper
form Carl Edwards, teammate
Clint Bowyer, Denny Hamlin,
■ NUTS AND BO)
Gaughan
tary Appreciation Program,
one component being a rela
tionship with the A-10 Tactical
Fire Squadron School at Nellis
Air Force Base. Gaughan and a
Sgt. Freeman in Gaughan’s
words “a special operations
guy” competed in the half
marathon on Dec. 10.
“He (Freeman) basically
called me out,” said Gaughan.
“He called me a chicken, and,
in the words of Michael J. Fox’s
character in ‘Back to the Fu
ture,’ nobody calls me yellow.
“Right now, I think every
joint in my body hurts,” said
Gaughan the day after the
event.
quite a bit smaller in 2007. Harvick has an
nounced he won't compete for the Busch title
again, though he will be around for a lot of the
races. The latest estimate is that only Ed
wards, Dave Blaney and David Ragan will com
pete full-time in both series.
That, of course, makes Edwards the odds
on favorite. Though obliterated by Harvick, Ed
wards won four races and collected 25 top-10
finishes, which are numbers that would proba
bly win the title in most seasons.
For what it's worth, there isn't any historical
problem with Cup drivers making appearances
in the Busch Series from time to time. The de
sire of prominent drivers to be active in other
series is as old as the sport itself. A.J. Foyt
and Mario Andretti, among many others, used
the gradual implementation of the so
called Car of Tomorrow. The COT will
be used in 16 of the 36 races, while
the existing chassis design will be
used in the other 20. As a result,
teams must build and maintain two
completely different sets of cars. It
won’t be easy, and it won’t be inex
pensive.
■ Sometime in January, NASCAR
chairman Brian France will finally an
nounce whatever changes are to be
made in the format of the Chase. It ap
pears more and more as if the changes
will be relatively minor.
Chevy in USAC Two-time
Nextel Cup champion Tony
Stewart announced that
Chevrolet will provide power
and sponsorship for his entries
in the United States Auto Club
and World of Outlaws next
year.
Levi Jones and Tracy Hines
will drive for Tony Stewart
Racing in the USAC National
Midget and Sprint Car divi
sions. The two will also com
pete in the Silver Crown events
scheduled for dirt tracks. Paul
McMahan returns for a second
season driving TSR’s winged
sprint cars in the World of Out
laws.
■
It’s spreading The Hooters
Pro Cup Series announced re
cently that it will adopt the so
called “lucky dog rule” - i.e., a
free pass back on the lead lap
for one driver during each cau
tion period - next year.
Naturally, it will be officially
referred to as the “Aaron’s
Lucky Dog.”
“The Hooters Pro Cup Series
marathon in his
hometown, Las
Vegas, as a re
sult of a chal
lenge from a
friend in the Air
Force.
Gaughan’s
team has a Mili-
■
SATURDAY, DECEMBER 23, 2006 ♦
to show up at sprint-car tracks while they were
winning Indy-car titles.
But too many Cup drivers can stunt the
growth of the young drivers coming up, and
that's the situation that was in place in 2006.
Cup drivers won every Busch race but two.
Menard won once, as did David Gilliland.
As Cup teams began filling vacancies, the
common view was that all the talent had been
tapped. Why was there a shortage of talent? In
part, it was because the Busch Series had run
dry, and most of the water from the well had
been guzzled by Cup drivers and teams.
By Monte Dutton
NASCAR This Week
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■ .< s ,|j
Earnhardt
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
vs. Teresa Earnhardt
In a Wall Street Journal interview,
the driver had his commitment ques
tioned by his stepmother, who sug
gested Junior might spend too much
of his time engaged in activities oth
er than racing.
NASCAR This Week's Monte
Dutton gives his take: “This is all
about posturing. Earnhardt Jr.'s con
tract is up at the end of 2007. The
biggest story here, by the way, is
that Teresa Earnhardt granted an in
terview, and she seized a fine oppor
tunity to float a trial balloon.”
FAN
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CIA Stock Photo
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Jeff Gordon and new wife Ingrid
Gordon placing
premium on family
It has been a holiday season Jeff
Gordon won't soon forget.
He announced on Dec. 13 that
his new wife, Ingrid Vandebosch, is
pregnant. In a statement on his Web
site (www.jeffgordon.com), Gordon
said: “We're obviously very excited.
Christmas came early for us this
year. This is a very special gift for
us, one that we're both looking for
ward to. The due date is early July,
and Ingrid and I can’t wait to be par
ents. We've known for a little while,
but we couldn't wait any longer to
share the good news with our friends
and fans."
On Dec. 16, he helped cut the
ribbon at the Jeff Gordon Children’s
Hospital, a 28-bed pediatric unit at
North East Medical Center in Con
cord, N.C. Gordon, who made chil
dren's charities a top priority of his
foundation, pledged $1 million of the
roughly sll million needed for the
project.
Monte Dutton
has tried to level the playing
field on many fronts, and the
‘lucky dog’ is just an extension
of that,” said series director
Tony Cox. “If somebody has
some bad luck early in the
race, we’d hate to think that
their chances of winning were
over.”
■
Friendly wager During the
Chick-Fil-A Bowl in Atlanta on
Dec. 30, the outcome will de
cide the outcome of a wager
between the presidents of
Richmond International Race
way and Atlanta Motor Speed
way.
Rlß’s Doug Fritz has Vir
ginia ham and peanuts wa
gered on Virginia Tech. AMS’s
Ed Clark has Georgia peaches
and pecans riding on the Uni
versity of Georgia.
Odd, by the way, that the
peanuts come from Virginia,
not Georgia.
Contact Monte Dutton
at hmduttonso@aol.com
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