This is likely going to be termed a “racing deal” by NASCAR with no penalties which has been the case of similar incidents in the past. That’s too bad because pit road retaliation is simply dangerous. After a race the cars stop near the entrance of pit road so NASCAR officials can remove their transponders. The last thing they need is two angry drivers ramming each other within their vicinity. Vickers and Speed never considered their team members who are going to have to repair these cars within the confines of a schedule that already too tight. They certainly weren’t considering their respective Nationwide team owners who are going to have to write the checks to cover the damage.
WAZZUP with driver Willie Allen? On lap three of the race NASCAR officials gave him a black flag and ordered him to park the car. It seems that the team didn’t have an official crew chief presiding over pit road procedures. Allen was given credit for 42nd place. The good news is this seemingly “start and park” team did manage to collect $15,650 for the three laps.
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THE MEMPHIS TRAVEL.COM 200
HOORAH to the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series for Saturday’s highly entertaining race at the Memphis Motor Sports Park. The tail gate party shines on short tracks and, to no real surprise, the race ended with another green-white-checker finish complete with the element of fuel mileage in the mix.
This race was ran under extreme conditions due to the heat in Memphis that day. The daytime temperature was 98 degrees with a heat index of 109. The track temperature was a whopping 133 degrees meaning the temperature inside of the race trucks was in excess of 150 degrees. Now somebody try to tell me these guys aren’t athletes.
HOORAH to Ron Hornaday Jr for another dominant performance that led to his second consecutive series win and his 42th career win in 135 starts. Had it not been for a late in race caution, with six laps to go, this race would’ve been another Hornaday runaway win. Hornaday also padded his points lead to 76 over Matt Crafton.
You can be sure that Hornaday loves the Kevin Harvick Inc Chevrolet he was driving. The particular truck, dubbed chassis #27, has four wins in six outings. He also got to take home the speedway’s special trophy: a bronze statue of Elvis. This was important to Hornaday because this was the last of the special trophy which will be completely redesigned in 2010.
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LIVE AND ON THE AIR.
Well almost anyway in regards to this first item. WAZZUP with the noticeable absence of Bill Webber from the TNT broadcast booth during last Sunday’s Sprint Cup race in New Hampshire? Last Friday TNT officials raised more than just a few eyebrows when they announced that the veteran NASCAR broadcaster had been suspended from participating in Sunday’s race and could possibly be suspended beyond that point.
It seems that Webber was involved in an altercation at a hotel lobby in Manchester-New Hampshire. TNT officials said this incident was of a personal nature and made it clear that they do not comment on personal issues. TNT’s Ralph Sheheen filled in for Webber last Sunday and did a very good job.
WAZZUP with TNT’s audio-video link during last Sunday’s pre race show? There seemed to be a slight time differential between the audio and the video during interviews. The person being interviewed would finish a sentence but his lips kept on moving. It was reminiscent of those 1970’s era Japanese kung fu movies that were dubbed into english.
HOORAH to driver Rick Crawford for being DJ for a day at the Sirius Satellite Radio’s Memphis studios whose format is “all Elvis all of the time.” Crawford is the self proclaimed biggest Elvis fan in the world. He has quite a collection of Elvis artifacts including the sheet music for the 1956 hit “Heartbreak Hotel, replicas of the king’s gold records as well as an autographed photo of Elvis that was given to him by a racing fan in Milwaukee. Crawford also has a piece of clothing from a dress worn by actress Ann Margaret from the Elvis movie “Viva Las Vegas.”
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AND FINALLY
The final WAZZUP goes to driver Carl Edwards who recently appeared in a TV commercial for one of his primary sponsors: Subway Restaurants. Recent Subway ads has featured their foot long sandwich specials with people singing the jingle “five-five-five dollar foot longs.” Edwards himself took a swing at singing this jingle but unfortunately his singing is just a little off. In fact it sounded like a set of flat spotted Goodyear tires.
The final HOORAH goes to my racing buddy “Six Pack Eddie” who called me recently to inform me of a new commercial in production featuring two of Carl Edwards’ sponsors: Subway and Aflac Insurance. It seems the two corporations are doing some co-branding using a new commercial that spotlight’s Subway’s new sandwich. The main ingredient of the new sandwich is, you guessed it, roast duck.. “Six Pack Eddie” swears that you can actually hear the duck screaming “A-F-L-A-C !!!” from the other side of the oven door.
This is probably just another NASCAR rumor but how cool would it be if it turned out to be true?
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