Sofa Sideline – Young Guns Ablaze at Fontana
Jimmie Johnson, just a few races into his Winston Cup
career, takes the win at the Napa Auto Parts 500 in Fontana this past weekend.
After many years of major sponsorship, Lowe’s finally is partnered with a
driver that can bring it home. Congratulations to Jimmie and members of the
Hendricks Motorsports team for a great run!
The dominant car for the day, and one that, at one point
had built a 15-second lead, was the number 97 of Kurt Busch. It just seemed like
no one would be able to beat him, but with about 40 laps to go Johnson had moved
into the top five, and took over the lead with 23 laps remaining just before the
caution flew for the scary accident when Dale Jr. ran into Kevin Harvick.
The decision to take gas only left the number 48 in the
top spot, and Busch, after having a heck of time getting by Ricky Rudd for the
number 2 position, was not able to gain enough momentum to overtake Johnson. The
clean air for the lead car seems to make a difference – just about everywhere.
Rounding out the top ten were; Rudd 3rd;
Elliott 4th; Martin 5th; Jarrett 6th; Marlin 7th;
Rusty Wallace 8th; Blaney 9th and Waltrip in the 10th
position. The other rookie in the group, Ryan Newman, got a lap down early on
and never was able to get back on the lead lap. Newman still managed to finish
14th.
It was a tough, tough day for the Gibbs cars; again. Bobby
Labonte made a stop on lap 71 to repair a faulty water pump belt – losing 9
laps in the process and winding up with a 34th place finish and
dropping a couple more spots in the points as a result. Tony Stewart didn’t
fare much better as he had to make a stop on lap 127 to put a band-aid on a
broken throttle linkage, losing 3 laps and winding up in 29th place.
If this keeps up, I may actually have to back off my prediction for the
championship.
Rumors abound that this team is switching to Chevrolet
next season. Who can blame them? Pontiac is supposedly courting other teams to
come on board, one being, Ricky Craven, fearing the loss of the Gibbs bunch.
From a layperson’s view, it does seem that the Pontiacs’ are definitely
lacking something this year. Johnny Benson/Kenny Schrader – two other Pontiac
teams that come to mind as not having such a hot year.
The race is Fontana is generally a "snoozer" and
this was no exception, although for the last 40 laps or so the competition was
intense. It was pretty scary for a few minutes after seeing Dale Earnhardt Jr.
take such a hard hit from Kevin Harvick. After blowing a left front tire,
Harvick almost saved it, but Junior came up on him just as Harvick was coming
down the track. The resulting hit took the breath away, and left Dale Jr. with a
badly bruised ankle. Luckily, no other injuries were sustained.
This series moves on to Richmond this weekend – one of
my favorite tracks to watch a race, and one where there is always a lot of
action.
Other news:
Yesterday would have been the "Man in Black’s"
51st birthday. In celebration, Dale Earnhardt, Inc. opened its doors
to all the fans beginning at 8:00 a.m. and staying open until 9:00 p.m. It was
reported that some fans lined up as early as 5:30 a.m. to gain entrance.
There has no one who has forgotten that fateful day –
but what we do now is celebrate the life of the man we’ve come to know even
better this past year. We remember all the good deeds, the many stories
surrounding his friendships, and the absolute peace he seemed to have attained.
His life was good.
We got a chance to watch the ARCA series race live from
Salem, Indiana, where we saw Frank Kimmel continue to dominate. After
experiencing engine problems, Kimmel restarted at the rear of the field twice,
and managed to work his way through the entire field to take the win.
Congratulations go out to Frank – he just can’t be beat these days!
That’s it for now.