Hamilton and Petty: Let’s You and Him Fight
So we leave a concrete bowl and head for a
two-mile oval, and upon leaving the bowl, we get something the sport may
suddenly be seeing more of, and which the sport perhaps needs to juice up competitiveness
that has staled of late – genuine, hate-filled driver anger.
Bobby Hamilton was livid at NASCAR’s
non-calls over two contact incidents in the Mason-Dixon 200. "If NASCAR
isn’t going to do anything," Hamilton said to the Winston-Salem Journal,
"then just turn their cars head-on." Now I summon up my Casablanca cop
impersonation – for I am shocked, SHOCKED to hear this from a Winston Cup
driver. I’m also glad to hear it.
"The cleaned-up image they have for
drivers today is BS," ex-engineman Lou Larosa wrote in 1998. "’A guy
bumped me, but that’s okay, I love him anyway,’ is BS……You have to be
aggressive, focused, and determined. You don’t win races if you’re not."
The cleaned-up image indeed is garbage,
and the general lack of retaliation for contacts is also stupid. "I told
(Ernie Irvan) the other day (in July 1991), ‘we’ll race each other, you hit me
and I’m gonna crash you,’" Rusty Wallace said. "Don’t jack with me,
boy, I’ll do it four times worse to you," Richard Petty told his future
driver Hamilton after North Wilkesboro in April 1991. "You beat up my
racecars, I’ll kick your (butt)," The King fanged to his then-past and
soon-future driver John Andretti in March 1996.
Hamilton continues after this past June’s
Dover event – "All of us here in the Winston Cup garage are supposed to be
here because we’re good racecar drivers. If we’re that good, we shouldn’t have
to run over people to get positions."
This illustrates the paradox of this issue
– realistically they SHOULDN’T have to drill each other to pass. But it boils
down to the issue that won’t go away – the fundamental unraceability of modern
racecars. That modern racecars have too much power, too little raw drag, and run
on tires that do not allow drivers to force their way forward is well known. Add
in an unraceable surface in concrete, and you get a formula that hurts
competition.
"The point is, every race is not
supposed to have a finish as thrilling as (the Atlanta 500 of this year),"
David Green writes. This, though, doesn’t mean that there can’t be a lot more in
the way of races such as last year’s Winston 500 – in NASCAR’s competitive
heyday of 1971-84 such racing was quite routine. 40-plus lead changes have
become the norm again at the plate tracks with aero anchors, and ought to be the
norm elsewhere – in the past 45 lead changes a race was common at Michigan and
at Pocono, something those tracks should be seeing today.
Richard Petty has come under fire for
remarks in the Chicago Sun-Times calling on the media to put Dale Earnhardt’s
death out of their mind and focus on racing. Among the critics is Jack Arute.
Petty, though, is correct. Earnhardt’s
death was certainly tragic, but the obsessive dwelling on it and the
micro-coverage of the fatal crash have not helped in any way – instead a lot of
it has obfuscated the sport in ridiculous detail about skull fractures, etc. The
majority of coverage on safety in the wake of his death has been less than
useful, too often misleading in its touting of the effectiveness of the HANS
collar, soft walls, etc.
Petty also questioned Earnhardt’s driving
ability – "(Earnhardt) wasn’t that dominant a driver," Petty said.
"He was not a standout."
This train of thought begs for more
probing. Earnhardt won the most races in the season only twice – 1987 and 1990 –
where Petty won the most races in the season seven times – 1963, 1967, 1968
(tied with David Pearson), 1970, 1971, 1974 (tied with Cale Yarborough), and
1975.
Earnhardt won his last six titles in an
era when he raced for wins while racing for points became the norm for everyone
else; only in 1993 and ’94 was he racing someone (Rusty Wallace) who raced for
wins – Petty won all seven of his titles by racing for wins when those he raced
against ALSO raced for wins – and with some frequency resulting in some serious
damage to sheet metal. His 1964 title came when Ned Jarrett won more races and
David Pearson won almost as many as Petty; in 1971 he had to race Bobby Allison
week after week and their competition became blistering-hot; his 1972 title came
when Bobby Allison won more races and the two wrecked each other with abandon in
the September short track swing; in 1974 he sweated out the most lead changes
NASCAR had ever seen to that point and Cale Yarborough tied him for wins and led
more laps; in 1979 he had to quickly learn new cars and engines of the type with
which his competition had had five years experience; he erased a 200-plus point
deficit and as Gene Granger noted at the time, his driving was harder than it
had ever been.
The one stake in Earnhardt’s favor was
that his titles came with more teams capable of winning races than in Petty’s
heyday, but this was squandered because, again, racing for points became the
norm instead of the exception. Earnhardt was known as The Intimidator, but the
old guard of Petty, Cale, Bobby Allison, etc. were guys he couldn’t intimidate;
a favorite moment of mine was at Pocono in July 1986 when Earnhardt sideswiped
Petty exiting the pits and Petty stuffed him to the Tunnel Turn wall next time
around.
Ultimately, the sport needs to put
Earnhardt’s death out of its mind and race. Petty himself showed the way in 1975
after Randy Owens’ death at Talladega – before the World 600 Petty got the team
together and made them put Randy out of their mind; they then went on to win six
races and finish second in five in the ensuing 13-race span. At Talladega in
August "I didn’t even want to go…..because of Randy and
all……Nevertheless, I put it out of my mind. I had a race to run." Petty
made clear he’d give it all back to get Randy Owens back, but as that was
unfeasible, putting his death out of the team’s mind was what they needed to do.
Jack Arute’s criticisms are broader – he
basically takes aim at NASCAR because he sees Petty’s criticisms as "an
effort to ‘sell in’ a NASCAR defense against the big bad media." He
discusses his initial skepticism of the Orlando Sentinel’s investigation of
Earnhardt’s death, then states, "That was before Bill Simpson and his
company were labeled scapegoats – before rescue workers were harassed – before
NASCAR strong-armed silence."
Excuse me, Jack, but just where did NASCAR
strong-arm silence? The outstanding quality of the issue is that NASCAR’s
responses are generally feeble and un-confrontational, yet criticisms are
relentless and often misleading. Bill Simpson is the one who got his company
labeled scapegoats – he himself admitted to Liz Chandler in Ms. Chandler’s May 3
examination of the belt controversy that he saw the belt, examined the car,
concluded it wasn’t installed properly, and discussed with NASCAR a process
called Dumping that breaks belts in the fashion as Earnhardt’s – subsequent
Autoliv and other crash recreations have seen the dumping process break or tear
at belts in circumstances similar to Earnhardt’s.
And where did NASCAR harass rescue
workers? The one who said, "I know what happened and I’m not allowed to
talk?" The day after she said that, there she was on TV talking her ears
off. Tom Propst? His story has collapsed amid the logical fallacies listed in
the above-mentioned Chandler piece and in the fact he went to the media first –
a sure sign of publicity seeking; going to investigators, insurance people,
anyone EXCEPT the media is the proper course of action, but instead he went to
the media first.
Sorry, Jack. I’m with The King on this
one.
Petty’s team has struggled this year with
the switchover to Dodge, and here comes a Jerry Bonkowski piece advocating a
complete overhaul of the team via reduction to one car. Bonkowski ignores that
multi-car teams are a necessity today with NASCAR’s seven-test limit – if it
were eliminated (something NASCAR needs to do, in fact) reduction to one team
would make sense.
Bonkowski is right about how Kyle Petty
has far too much on his plate as an owner-driver, but he takes some shots at
Kyle’s driving success that are misleading and unfair.
Rumors that Larry McReynolds, known to be
close to Buckshot Jones, may come to the team as a manager once his FOX duties
for the year end, continue. The recent change regarding Chris Hussey and Doug
Hewitt, though, should be given some more time before gauging their
effectiveness.
Just what were Frank Cicci and Scott
Welliver thinking? Axing Tim Fedewa was stupid enough, but then they compounded
their mistake by hiring a has-been like Geoff (don’t call him Geoffrey) Bodine.
Bodine cannot add anything to their program anymore than he did with Joe Bessey.
The Winston-Salem Journal did a piece on
Mike Skinner that included the observation that sponsors pressure owners into
hiring "the perfectly marketable driver."
When will the sport tell the sponsors to
stay out of team decision making and just sponsor the cars? Running up front
should be sufficient marketability for sponsors.