Pocono – Hey, Spencer! 500 Miles Is Right
The Pocono 500 has been run, and it proved a replay of sorts to 1976 when the
leader blew a tire within sight of the checkered flag. Dale Jarrett’s win was
his third at the track and Robert Yates’ seventh, four as DiGard Racing’s engine
builder and three as a car owner.
While hardly the best event there, this Pocono 500 had quite a few bizarre
moments, from John Andretti and Kyle Petty’s green flag stops just as Joe
Nemechek smashed the third turn wall, to the rash of broken transmissions, to
Jeff Gordon’s spin in the pits, to the bizarre final five laps. Lost amid the
chaos of the ending was that Jimmy Spencer and Bobby Labonte crashed, coming to
the stripe sporting damage to their right sides.
500 miles is quite a distance anywhere, and it is a superior test of
machinery and driving than 400 miles, especially on a 2.5 mile track – 400 miles
is simply an incomplete distance.
But leave it to Jimmy Spencer to open his mouth and whine about it. He cites
TV concerns, never mind that TV generally prefers these long races to short
ones. He cites that Dover and Rockingham shortened their races, but is lying
through his teeth in claiming they are better for it – no 400 miler at either
has had the shift in outcomes that the extra 100 miles usually brought before.
Dover in particular has not seen a really good 400 miler other than the ’99
Delaware 400 since the last 500-miler there in June 1997.
Spencer and the others claiming 500 miles is too long are just getting old
and need to tell their stats to shut up and race. Joe Mattioli has no intention
of cheating the fans (and the drivers) with a shorter race, and these drivers
need to just race.
There was quite a rash of transmission breakage, most of it in the first 300
miles (which further discredits the call for shorter distances, one of whose
premises being that shorter races mean less attrition). The deal with shifting
gears at Pocono has, as one commentator supposedly put it, gotten out of hand.
NASCAR had an opportunity to ban the Jericho transmission on ovals in 1992-3,
and indeed some drivers lobbied for such a ban – Terry Labonte noted in 1992,
"Shifting is a pain in the butt." But NASCAR did nothing, and the
result is that drivers, by shifting instead of running 4th gear like an oval,
are racing the track more than before, which interferes with passing.
Not that there wasn’t passing – there were some nifty maneuvers during the
day by several drivers. But the general inability of the cars to suck up to and
pass one another in dirty air reared its ugliness yet again, and shifting only
made it worse.
The traffic situation at Pocono, always a sore spot with many, nonetheless
keeps improving, particularly in entry. Exiting the track is still a problem due
to having the haulers leaving first, but the track nonetheless keeps working to
get it better.
Some of the problem with entry is the state police’s stupid refusal to let
cars run the breakdown lane on I-80 to Route 115 on race morning – several cars
cheated and ran the breakdown lane and shaved a sizable amount of time to the
track. Once people got on Route 115 it began to move with some smoothness, and
at one point even got to fourth gear before the backup resumed.
On exit, cars were instructed to maintain three lines, but instead they were
hogging two, which aggravated exit from the track all the more
So traffic snarls, inevitable at any Winston Cup track, nonetheless are still
inching better at Pocono.
Richard Childress received the Raceway’s Bill France Sr. Award in pre-race
ceremonies. The unfortunate punch line was that two of his three cars were junk
again – Jeff Green’s brakes caught fire very early, and Kevin Harvick was a
rolling lump all race long – and his third, Robby Gordon, got into two scrapes –
first he sent John Andretti into the wall; then he got into Ricky Craven and
both slid up to the wall – in which second got him a cut tire.
RCR’s RAD mates at DEI did better. Mikey Waltrip, apparently now realizing
his days at DEI are numbered, posted his second top ten in three races, while
Junior finished twelfth and admitted during the weekend to looking at
opportunities with other teams.
Yet again Chevrolet was nowhere to be found in victory contention despite
Hendrick Motorsports’ two top fives at the end. Since Jeff Gordon’s Summer 500
win here in 1998, Ford has won four of the last seven Pocono races with Bobby
Labonte – who ran so badly with transmission trouble it was stunning that he was
anywhere close to anyone – taking the other three.
The manufacturer scorecard after 14 weeks – Ford five, Dodge three, Pontiac
three, Chevrolet three. Despite Chevy’s consistent weakness, Pontiac’s
near-collapse, and Dodge’s slump since March, the manufacturer battle is
strikingly close.
Joe Mattioli was featured in a very interesting article in Speedway
Illustrated. Among his comments was that he has deliberately not sought title
sponsors for his races. This is a refreshing change, as sponsor overkill –
brilliantly parodied in Havoline’s Ricky Rudd victory interview commercial –
needs to stop.
Meanwhile the IRL had its first trip to Texas, and what was a Tomas Scheckter
runaway for so long turned into a stunning finish. Al Unser Jr. ran down Helio
Castroneves in the final laps, but Jeff Ward swept up high and beat Unser by a
wing at the finish. The win was the first in the IRL for Ward in his 51st start
in the league, and the second for Chip Ganassi.
Airton Dare finished third in A.J. Foyt’s #14, a heartwarming finish for the
team after considerable struggle all season.
The surprise of the race was Shigeaki Hattori, sixth in Buzz Calkin’s #12.
Hattori not only led 28 laps, but the way he led was something to see – he
battled nose to nose for the lead for some six straight laps.
One has to wonder what Tomas Scheckter has to do to win a race, having led
the most laps for two straight events only to kill the starter on his final
stop. His boss Eddie Cheever also had a bad night, crashing with Sam Hornish
while battling for position.
With appropriate apologies to WEEI Radio – It’s a TED NATION!
The weekend was a good one for Ted Christopher. First he ended a season-long
slump in SK Mods at Stafford on Friday night, then he bagged his second Mod Tour
win of the year at Riverhead, NY, after Rick Fuller crashed out of the lead with
21 to go. Three races, three wins, and his personal score sheet for the season
shows two Tour wins, a GN North win, and three SK-class (one at Thompson, the
two at Stafford) wins.
Finally, condolences go to the family of Southwest Tour driver John Baker,
killed in a crash at Irwindale Speedway the night before the Pocono 500.