Feb. 27, 2008 - Gordon Deserves A Break On Appeal

Just last week, I spoke with National Stock Car Commission Chairman George Silbermann, who along with other members of the Commission will sometime soon hear Robby Gordon’s appeal of a $100,000 fine and docking of 100 championship points levied by NASCAR after the Daytona 500.

Silbermann has been in the business a long time. He seems like a decent sort. He doesn’t exactly bristle at the suggestion that the Commission is a rubber stamp for NASCAR, but he will provide statistics to refute it.

Gordon, who has had a pretty rough month when you count the millions of dollars he lost with the canceled Dakar Rally along with the potential loss of championship points in Sprint Cup, is counting on the Commission to act on what he believes could be a business-killing injustice for his single-car Robby Gordon Racing Sprint Cup enterprise.

The back story is this: After Daytona pre-season testing, Gordon quickly made the switch from Ford to Dodge with the promise of additional manufacturer support as well as a support agreement with Dodge’s flagship, Gillett Evernham Motorsports. RGR rushed to get its Dodge program up to speed. Someone at GEM accidentally sent out a bumper that is yet to be approved by NASCAR — it probably will be at some point, but it hadn’t been prior to Daytona. The difference between the approved bumper and the one sent to RGR was negligible — just a little aesthetic change — and no competitive advantage would have been gained had it made it to the track.

The folks at RGR, new to Dodge and its bumpers, had no reason to believe it was an illegal part.

GEM says so. Dodge says so. Robby Gordon says so, adding that the 100-points levied against the team would negate his impressive top-10 showing at Daytona, potentially pushing him out of the top-35 in owners’ points and into having to qualify for each race, a dangerous existence for a partially-sponsored team such as Gordon’s.

I hate the top-35 rule — it already benefits the sport’s power teams too heavily, while keeping the smaller teams such as Gordon’s on the edge of bankruptcy. But Gordon has been able to stay in the top 35, mainly because he’s one heck of a driver in just about anything and enough of a businessman to keep hustling enough sponsors to keep RGR afloat and largely competitive.

This wasn’t one of Chad Knauss’s annual forays into the “gray areas” of the NASCAR rulebook. This was a clerical error that happened to be caught by NASCAR’s technical inspectors.

This was an honest mistake, which, for once, was not even of Gordon’s making.

Here’s an analogy: Somebody steals your car and gets a DUI, and then you’re arrested because it was your car.

The National Stock Car Commission should see it that way. It should make sure that the punishment fits the crime — or the lack thereof in this case.

It should prove that it is not NASCAR’s rubber stamp.

Feb. 20, 2008 - It's Getting Cold In Here

It would appear that the temperature in Hell has dropped substantially with officials from Champ Car and the Indy Racing League close to hammering out a deal that would put American open-wheel racing under one umbrella for the first time since the two factions — then CART and the then fledgling Indy Racing League — split in 1995.

So, Satan’s wearing mittens, waiting with the rest of us for an announcement that could come as soon as Friday. You have to figure that if the press conference is scheduled for 11 a.m., Hell will be frozen over by 11:05 and a matinee hockey game (Devils vs. Flames, of course) will be scheduled for 3 p.m.

Of course, had the egos that polarized the sport had been checked at the door 13 years ago, none of this would be necessary. NASCAR would have still become a runaway marketing train, but maybe open-wheel racing wouldn’t have lost so much ground over the past decade or so.

Maybe sponsors such as AT&T, which could find itself out of NASCAR due to sponsorship legalities with the series sponsor Sprint after this season, would consider paying a fraction of what it spends in NASCAR to be the title sponsor of the IndyCar Series.

And maybe this would have happened back in 2004 when CART filed for bankruptcy, but Kevin Kolkhoven and partners decided they could build a better road-racing mousetrap — just like CART CEO Andrew Craig and all the others before them had —and the chasm that separated the newly named Champ Car World Series and the IRL was unnecessarily perpetuated if not widened.

And maybe fans would actually care about the sport beyond the month of May.

There are a lot of “maybes” out there, but the only one that really matters now is the one attached to the current negotiations — “maybe” there will be a deal and maybe Hell will freeze over when there finally is.

It is long overdue. It is a boost that the sport desperately needs. It would mean larger fields. It would mean the best open-wheel drivers around competing at Long Beach and Indianapolis.

It would be cool — cooler than Hell.

Feb. 13, 2008 - Right On Target

I’ve refrained from using Teresa Earnhardt for target practice — until now. Honestly, it’s been too easy, and I like a challenge.

So, she kept the No. 8. Technically, it was hers. So, she kept DEI. Technically, it was hers. So, Dale, Jr.’s trophies and such disappeared from the DEI cases just prior to the arrival of the media hordes for their annual preseason tour. Technically, they’re still there someplace unless she is re-gifting the trophies to the winners of all those equestrian events DEI is apparently involved in these days.

After the media horde arrived at DEI for the tour — presumably to ask questions — she took only one question from the press, and that one was a softball from the horde’s best slo-pitch pitcher.

So, Teresa is to step-motherhood… well, what Joan Crawford was to motherhood. So, she’s a race-team owner who’d rather be just about anywhere but a race track. So, she wants DEI to be some sort of entertainment, equestrian, racing juggernaut.

Fine.

I’m no huge Dale, Jr. mark. He’s had his issues, but he certainly seems to have grown into himself over the past few years.

That said, there’s an old saying among “old money” in the South that says new money “can’t buy class.”

When Teresa was taking a beating from the media — and especially from Junior Nation last year over the No. 8 — Dale, Jr. asked for people to give her a break. Maybe privately he snickered, but publicly he called off the Budweiser-drinking, red-wearing, 8-lovin’ dogs. Technically, I think she owes him one.

But this past week, Teresa was in Daytona, unveiling with Richard Childress a display of Dale Earnhardt, Sr.'s No. 3 car in honor of the 10th anniversary of his lone Daytona 500 victory. This came a matter of hours after Dale, Jr.’s Budweiser Shootout victory. So, the media there asked what she thought of her stepson’s win. Hey, the question was going to come up.

Instead of offering a hint of graciousness — even the manufactured kind — she essentially “no-commented,” saying she was there for the unveiling.

Oh, Teresa, Teresa. Please, for the love of Goodyear, hire a public-relations flack or some "Old Money" to coach you on these things. All you had to say was, “We’re very happy for him and wish him well.” Drivers do it all the time, even after rubbing fenders for 500 miles. You didn’t even have to mean it.

Otherwise, people like me, and all those Dale, Jr. fans will just keep on using you as target practice, which may not matter to you but it can't be good for business — and that's a horse of a different color.

Feb. 6, 2008 - It's Dangerous Out There

It’s very easy to forget just how dangerous a game this can be.

I spent part of last week at Golden Isles Speedway’s SuperBowl of Racing in Brunswick, Ga. It was a good trip with a little tire controversy thrown in amongst the races. I had a lunch at Willie’s Wee-Nee Wagon, a Brunswick tradition and wandered the pits between races.

On Saturday, the final night of the SuperBowl, two drivers in two different divisions ended up on their roofs. Neither driver was hurt, thankfully. I remember thinking to myself, “thank goodness for improved safety equipment.”

Then, just a little while ago, news came that modified driver Steve Arpin had to be taken to the hospital after suffering burns to his body after a disconnected radiator hose doused him with hot liquid as he worked on his car at East Bay Raceway.

I interviewed him for an upcoming feature story while at Golden Isles. Arpin is in his early 20s and just got married a few months ago. His wife, Trina, knows the deal. She grew up around race cars and works on them herself when needed. His dream of a NASCAR career is now one shared by both of them.

A radiator hose?

Arpin muscles his Harley dealership-sponsored modified race car around short tracks all over the country at literal break-neck speeds, yet he is injured in the pits by hot engine coolant.

Meeting the entire Arpin crew last week was a pleasure, and I hope Steve recovers quickly from his injuries and is back on the track soon.

And as the racing season begins in earnest, just a reminder to drivers and crew members a'la the old acclaimed TV show, "Hill Street Blues":

"Hey, hey! Let's be careful out there."