April 30, 2008 - Early Sunday Morning...

I’ll be up early Sunday morning, which really isn’t like me. Usually, I’m stirring just in time for “CBS Sunday Morning,” which I’ve long held to be the best show on TV.

But this Sunday I’ll be up and on the road to Rockingham (N.C.) Speedway (nee North Carolina Speedway), where I never thought I’d ever see another race. Despite producing some classic NASCAR Cup races for more than three decades, it turns out Rockingham, N.C., just doesn’t have the it-factor of the Dallas, Texas Metroplex or Las Vegas.

I am a son of the South, and I am still wounded when I think of places such as Rockingham and North Wilkesboro, both North Carolina enclaves which played a large role in NASCAR’s history only to have their races, pride and livelihoods pulled from underneath them the way a magician tries to pull a tablecloth from underneath a table full of dishes without disturbing a single fork.

No such luck for Rockingham, Wilkesboro and the like. Even mighty Darlington lost a race and seemed destined to lose its spring date with NASCAR before ownership promised critical and needed capital improvements, while selling out despite being shuffled to Mother’s Day weekend, a date traditionally shunned by the racing establishment.

Small towns all over the Southeast were already losing the textile mills that were their lifeblood when NASCAR headed for the brighter lights and bigger cities out West. They sought desperately for new identities and ways to put people to work.

Similarly, the small towns that lost big races have struggled to reinvent themselves as well.

Neither is an easy task.

But this weekend “The Rock” reopens for racing under the watch of new owner Andy Hillenburg, a former driver who paid $4 million for the place less than a year ago and was cheered by locals when he did because he promised to bring racing back to the track.

That promise comes true this Sunday with the ARCA RE/MAX Series Carolina 500. A Hooters Pro Cup race is also scheduled for this fall.

I’m glad he wasn’t outbid by Blackwater, the para-military security firm that would have used the place as a training ground. I’m glad HIllenburg had enough backing to outbid real-estate developers or whomever else placed their bids that day.

Racing is returning to “The Rock,” where it belongs. I hope a full house shows up to watch the ARCA guys, even as Sprint Cup races in California, Las Vegas and elsewhere play to a lot of empty seats in what I’ve called a bit of karmic payback to all those who were lured by brighter lights and bigger paydays.

I’ll be up Sunday morning, and that’s OK. It’s a nice drive down to Rockingham and, hopefully, a better race.

April 23, 2008 - Patrick's Perfect Timing

Maybe the only people on the planet happier than Danica Patrick over the weekend were the people who run the Indy Racing League.

The “buzz” surrounding the IndyCar Series was dying just a little when the IndyCar field was split with traditional IRL teams heading to Motegi, Japan, while the Champ Car refugees and stalwarts staged their finale at the Grand Prix of Long Beach.

Then, Danica-mania hit. OK, so it was the middle of the night back here on the East coast. But only Danica would be hitting the talk-show circuit after a win at Twin Ring Motegi.

Whoever is writing this script is doing a great job. First, a great but unknown personality to the mainstream, Helio Castroneves, wins a Hollywood dancing competition on one of the country’s most-watched TV shows, gaining more exposure for himself and the IndyCar Series for doing the Paso Doble than for passing to win either of his two Indianapolis 500 titles.

Then, the fractured open-wheel portion of American auto racing is reunified, stirring interest in the sport that has been missing from both sponsors and fans for more than a decade.

And now Patrick is known for something other than not winning races and racy photo shoots, which is a big deal for her as a driver who was being compared more to former ingénue tennis sensation Anna Kournikova than to Graham Rahal and her 20-something peers on the track.

Yes, it was a great week for Patrick.

But it was a better week for the IndyCar Series.

April 16, 2008 - Our Hokie Nation

It’s been a little more than a year since I arrived here at NSSN and exactly one year since the senseless massacre at Virginia Tech.

It was a horrible, horrible scene that mesmerized all of us here at the office as it played out on national television. None of us could believe the nightmare as it unfolded from Blacksburg, Va. We thought of Columbine and wondered what has happened to our world.

For a long time now, I’ve worked in life’s toy department, covering sports scenes in Indianapolis, Savannah, Ga., the South Carolina Upstate and now here.

Will Dale, Jr. go or stay? Will Toyota be competitive? Who’s sponsoring whom?

Then, we find out that the toy department is just an aisle or two away from the important stuff, the often times tragic stuff.

Turns out we all knew someone who had some sort of connection to the Blacksburg campus that day — the daughter of a friend or an engineer who was working with a race team in one series or another.

Virginian Ward Burton the very next race had his Morgan-McClure No. 4 sporting a Virginia Tech paint scheme. Crew members in NASCAR wore Tech baseball caps. Virginia Tech logos were on race cars in just about every series in the U.S.

It was a sad, sad day, and the wound is still open in Blacksburg.

But on that day, we all came Virginians. We all became Hokies.

April 9, 2008 - CoT Proved Itself

There’s a little inside joke of mine with my peers in the media. Anyone I have ever interviewed one on one, face to face becomes a “close personal friend” (or a CPF if you’re texting).

That list is now pretty darned long and somewhat distinguished, but I thought when I turned the TV to NASCAR Sprint Cup qualifying from Texas on Friday that my list of CPF’s had just gotten a little shorter.

Just as I turned over to Speed, Michael McDowell was beginning his qualifying lap. As he entered Turn 1, either something broke or he hit some oil or oil-dry from an earlier incident. His car shot right and into the Safer-Barrier in Turn 1, nose-first. From there he turned and flipped some eight times before finally coming to rest as emergency crews rushed to the wreckage.

The No. 00 Aaron’s “Dream Machine,” was a nightmare of mangled metal with a Sprint Cup rookie inside. For a second there, it didn’t look like McDowell would make his second Sprint Cup start. Then McDowell, who I ate lunch with and interviewed for an NSSN feature along with his dad and uncle at a local Hooter’s a few months ago, got out of the car and stood on his own two feet.

He was a little wobbly as he headed to the ambulance, looking a little like he was heading out of the bar after last call, but he made it there on his own.

I’d call it a McMiracle, but I know how hard NASCAR and track officials have worked at safety, especially since the death of Dale Earnhardt. The Safer-Barrier did its job and so did the roll cage and driver’s seat. McDowell escaped with a few bumps and bruises.

Say what you want about the CoT, but it was supposed to be safer and it is — at least McDowell wouldn’t argue the point, and his opinion certainly has to count for something these days.

The important thing is he’s able to say it. That’s good. He’s got a great career ahead of him — and I need all the friends I can get.

April 2, 2008 - Mosley Out? No Butts About It

It was your typical Monday. All of us at NSSN were working diligently to get this week’s edition out, and one of the most powerful men in sports got caught with his pants down.

Literally.

On video.

With — count’em — FIVE prostitutes dressed as both prisoners and guards for FIA President Max Mosley’s, uhm, meeting.

Now, the whole “sex dungeon” scenario is one thing, but the other part of the story is that Mosley’s get-together had a Nazi-concentration-camp theme.

Oops.

This is the part that has a lot of people calling for Mosley’s resignation, including former F-1 drivers Jackie Stewart and Jody Scheckter.

Sex is one thing, but having that mingled with Nazi fantasies is something totally different.

Of course, part of the back-story on Mosley himself makes all of this even more strange — as if getting strapped by a quintet of hookers and then
drinking tea with them in the nude afterward could get much more strange — Mosley’s father, Oswald, was the leader of the fascist movement in England and friends with Adolph Hitler prior to World War II.

The problem is should a guy whose fantasy life is so close to that reality really hold such a high-profile leadership position in any sport?

The irony is that in other sports, such as the NFL, NBA and Major League Baseball, the powers that be constantly have to police their players. Only
in motorsports do you apparently have to make sure 67-year-old heads of state stay away from the Viagra.

I’m not exactly a Puritan — whatever floats your boat, within reason — but FIVE, uhm, highly trained professionals? My God, it makes you wonder what Max did with that $100 million McLaren paid in fines last year.

Mosley should resign — and not because some people say so. He should resign because it will be impossible now for him to be an effective leader. If he cares at all about the sport he has ruled, then he has to step aside.

The world has seen him on the Web being knocked around by — count’em — FIVE, uhm, therapists. After that, it’s a little difficult to command respect from drivers, team owners, track officials — or mechanics, stewards, concessionaires and custodians for that matter.

Mosley has to resign. Otherwise, the whispers and snickers will never stop.

He will forever be the butt of everyone’s joke, so to speak.