Speedweeks Now A Smashing Success
Some miscellaneous thoughts as we close on the Qualifiers:
Remember when Jack Sprague drove Bill Baumgarder’s #74 Chevrolet in Grand
National? He ran in 1993 and lost the ride rather unglamorously.
Sprague reminded us why during Daytona 500 practice. Trying to force the
issue, Sprague swerved into Steve Park, then spun into Mike Skinner, sweeping up
Jeff Burton – already upset over his poor performances so far this Daytona – and
Elliott Sadler, who was livid since the wrecked car was Dale Jarrett’s
re-skinned 2000 Daytona 500 winner.
It brings to mind a quality about Sprague largely lost in his success in the
Trucks – he really isn’t that good a driver. Sprague has always shown a rather
sullen quality, and his attempt to blame it on Steve Park – who was holding his
line, and thus showing a discipline Sprague hasn’t in his career – shows
Sprague’s Winston Cup debut will be a rocky one.
The wall-banging didn’t quite stop there, as Ryan Newman ground into the wall
off Two late in the Wednesday AM drafting session, while Jimmie Johnson was
talking about his push despite being fastest that session.
The baseline everyone is shooting at is the baseline of Teresa Earnhardt’s
Chevrolets, Dale Junior and Michael Waltrip. Well, the sight of John Andretti
nearly passing them both in Four suggests that baseline can be reached by the
other teams, not that last year’s Autumn 500 at Talladega and the hard-fought
Daytona Shootout didn’t already show that, despite Junior’s convincing win in
both, he’s not invincible here.
Tony Stewart wasn’t the only driver sent to anger management – Kurt Busch was
also sent last year after his eruptions over several incidents. In the Shootout
he was among the more aggressive drivers, and the re-air of Geoff Bodine’s Truck
melee in 2000 reminds of who started that whole thing.
Speaking of Geoff Bodine, his Speedweeks ended with failure to qualify for
the Truck race. I suspect making the Truck race again is a goal, to offer
closure after the melee of 2002, the kind of closure that finishing third in
last year’s 500 might not have fully offered.
It hasn’t been a good month for the Bodine family, between Brett Bodine’s
miserable Speedweeks and his wife Diane Bodine’s bizarre travails with the law
already weighing on the family.
I suspect realignment is all but DOA. Bob Bahre was petitioned to lease a
race date to Kentucky Speedway, and emphatically refused. No one else will lease
a race date to another track, and Billy France made clear that Bruton Smith, who
has offered to purchase some ISC tracks, will not get anything in that regard.
It comes once again down to this fact – if Texas wants a second date, if
Kentucky wants a date, the Winston Cup schedule has to expand beyond 36 races.
Thus a rumored switch of the Rebel 400 at Darlington to a new Los Angeles 500 at
Fontana and switch of one of Rockingham’s dates to a second, mid-summer
400-miler at Kansas isn’t necessary.
All the proposed realignment talk did was turn track promoters, who ought to
be working together, against one another.
The Trucks got a savior. Toyota Racing Development has officially launched
its effort to field Toyota Trucks in NASCAR’s pickup division next year. A team
lineup hasn’t been made yet, but you can bet more than a few teams will be
lobbying for the help. Toyota’s involvement gives the Trucks the factory backing
it effectively lost after 2000, and that backing should help some teams
presently struggling to get to the front.
The entrance of Toyota also serves as a focal point of rivalry, for the
presence of the Japanese manufacturer will certainly antagonize much of the
sport’s fan base to root against Toyota’s pickups come next year’s Daytona 250
on down and thus root harder for Dodge, Chevrolet, and Ford.
Hopefully, Toyota’s entry will also spur the above-mentioned manufacturers to
step up their efforts in the series – Chevrolet ought to be backing teams like
the John Menard-backed #88 of Matt Crafton, the defending-champion #16 presently
driven by Matt Crafton, and the presently-sidelined Mike Addington #60 that has
seen so much success in the series. Dodge likewise ought to be backing more than
just Bobby Hamilton and Jim Smith’s teams (why on Earth did Dodge abandon the
Keselowski team?), and Ford needs to get back into the series.
The varied websites covering Speedweeks show a deficiency, for not all the
action is at Daytona. The area’s short tracks, such as New Smyrna, are also hot
and heavy with action this week, but coverage has been almost nonexistent.
Certainly Daytona action is newsworthy, but some ink and attention also belongs
on the area short tracks, notably with such stars as Ted Christopher in action.