Sofa Sideline – Fun in Kansas?

Gordon wins again!! The consistency and
patience of a winning team continues to shine through as Gordon powered the
number 24 to the front to win the inaugural event in Kansas this past Sunday.
The race was red flagged with ten laps to go, and when the green flag was
thrown, Gordon took the lead and was able to hold off a last minute charge by
the second place finisher, Ryan Newman. Gordon dedicated the race to Jason Dahl,
captain of United Flight #93 that crashed in rural Pennsylvania on September
11th. Jeff, Bobby Labonte, and many of the drivers had the opportunity to spend
some time with Captain Dahl’s son, Matt earlier on race day. Matt’s favorite
driver is Jeff Gordon, so who better to win!

The Dupont Chevrolet team has
"championship" written all over it, the confidence shows, and with
eight races remaining, a 222 point lead, I can’t see them losing. This
organization is just plain good.

Rounding out the top ten were; Ricky Rudd
3rd, Rusty Wallace 4th, Sterling Marlin 5th, Mark Martin 6th, Robert Pressley
7th, Tony Stewart 8th, Kurt Busch 9th, and Dave Blaney 10th.

Rusty Wallace led the most laps for the
day and appeared well on his way for the win, but a late race penalty for
speeding on pit road caused him to have to restart at the tail end of the cars
on the lead lap, and there just wasn’t enough time to make it back to the front.
He wound up finishing fourth. Rusty got "caught" while trying to win
the race off pit road to come out in front of Ricky Rudd. It was frustrating to
say the least, but its frustrating for us fans also, who want to see him win, to
see him make a mistake like that – remember last year?

As somewhat typical with a new track, the
race had its share of accidents – 13 yellow flags were thrown with 70 laps run
under caution, it left a lot of teams frustrated at the end of the day, to say
the least.

On lap one with everyone scrambling to try
to get to the bottom, Stacy Compton squeezed Casey Atwood, who was running on
the inside, causing Atwood to spin and hit the wall collecting John Andretti in
the process. Frustration mounted for the Evernham crew, after a great run by
Bill Elliott (leading 33 laps) was ruined by engine failure late in the race.
Tough day for that team.

Ward Burton also had another tough day, as
Jerry Nadeau ran into the back of him causing him to spin and hit the wall, and
doing major damage once again to the number 22. Ward’s disappointment was very
apparent as we saw him throw his glove at Nadeau when he went by him on the
track. Burton later said it was not so much he was mad at Jerry, it was dealing
with the fact that this was the 11th time this season he was taken out of the
race with irreparable damage to his car. That would cause anyone to get ticked
off, and we hope things improve during the remaining races for this team.

Johnny Benson was running in second place,
looking good, but on lap 184 he blew the engine. Dale Jr. was running in third
at the time and did a great job of handling his car with oil all over the
windshield, but with 39 laps to go, Earnhardt hit the wall hard and was out of
the race.

Matt Kenseth, the car really good, running
in fourth place, blew a right front tire, hit the wall, and sustained major
damage.

Dale Jarrett was taken to an area
hospital, later released, with a diagnosis of a mild concussion, sustained when
he and Bobby Labonte touched, resulting in Jarrett hitting the outside wall hard
on lap 247. Labonte had run up on the lapped car of Ricky Craven, with Jarrett
up on the outside of him, and as Jarrett came down across in front of him,
caused the front of the 18 to hit the back of the 88 and sent him spinning.
Bobby later said he was just not able to get out of it in time to prevent the
hit, and he was mainly concerned about Dale.

So needless to say, it was a rough one for
many of the teams. Hopefully, the track will be "broken in" more the
next time the Cup cars race there.

Other notes:

Hats off to Jeff Green for the win in the
Busch race on Saturday. That’s two for two, and I wouldn’t be surprised if it
becomes three this week in Charlotte. We may actually have a points race in that
division – well, maybe….

Just reading that Jeremy Mayfield is out
of the number 12 car immediately. That’s been coming for awhile, but now we can
speculate as to where he is going to go for next year.

Let’s see, Jimmy Spencer is not returning
to the number 26, and rumor has it he may go to the 12 or 33. So then, Nemechek,
where’s he going? Well, rumor has it that it may be with the Petty team, or
possibly the number 31, as we have not had the official word that Robby Gordon
has that ride.

Kevin LePage is out of the Kodak number 4
(also effective immediately), with Bobby Hamilton Jr. picking up the ride this
week in Charlotte. Mike Skinner has supposedly signed for that ride next year,
but it hasn’t been made official yet as far as I know. And there was speculation
about Skinner going to the 77?

Who knows – we’ll just have to wait to see
how it all shakes out. I have only one thought on this whole thing. I think they
should put someone really good in the other Childress car. That’s all I’m going
to say.

This week we move on to one of my favorite
tracks, Lowe’s Motor Speedway in Charlotte. My prediction — one of the Gibbs
team’s will win.

That’s all for now.