Apologies To Penske

I guess I owe Roger Penske an apology. Last year, I dissed his guest column of July 29, scoffing at his claim that the two open-wheel series would reunite before five years was out.
Well, after 12 years and umpteen false hopes, how was one to think any differently? Plus, he offered us no new insight in his column. But I guess Penske didn’t get where he is by being stupid, and I take my hat off to him. He was right, and I was wrong. At the same time, I was never so glad in my life to be wrong about anything.
Now the series can start to rebuild. It’s unrealistic to think it can ever match or catch NASCAR at this point, but it’s a start. Fine drivers like Paul Tracy, Justin Wilson, Bruno Junqueira and Robert Doornbos can be added to the mix. Oh yeah, and Graham Rahal, who, like Marco Andretti, is one of the future hopes of this sport. Now, if we can only persuade them to stay.

Bad Roush

Jack Roush strikes again! Joey Clanton brings Zaxby’s into the Truck Series as a sponsor; Roush fires Clanton and keeps Zaxby’s as a sponsor.
Joey, welcome to the world of Jack Roush — you have joined an ever-growing list of drivers (Danny O’Quinn, Stanton Barrett, Todd Kluever, Chuck Hossfeld, etc.) who have been totally shafted by the “Cat in the Hat.” Keep up the great work, Jack!

Awful At Atlanta

Sunday, I managed to talk a bunch of my non-racing friends to watch the race from Atlanta. I thought it was just another boring NASCAR race.
They all disagreed. They felt it was one of the most boring and pathetic excuses for a sporting event they have ever seen. I cannot believe there are people who do not like restrictor-plate racing.
While most of the Daytona 500 was a bore, the plate racing at least salvaged it at the end.

Tire-d Of Goodyear

I just finished watching the Kobalt Tools 500, and I’d like to say kudos to Tony Stewart for saying what I’ve been thinking the past 10 years.
What in the world has happened to the Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company? Outside of Michelin’s screw up at the U.S. Grand Prix a few years ago, I can’t think of any tire manufacturer that has dropped the ball in a major automobile race. Goodyear seems to do it at least a half-dozen times a year. Maybe NASCAR should consider a change to Hoosier or Firestone — at least then it will be the teams and drivers who decide the outcome of the races.

Unity Is Great

To say that the reunification of the two competing Indy-car series is long overdue would be a gross understatement. The reality is that the Champ Car World Series was on its last legs, as evidenced by the Chapter 11 filing recently in Indianapolis.
Kevin Kalkhoven’s portrayal of Tony George offering an olive branch was just a bit melodramatic. Please, spare us. The reality is there was no logical option. The deal is strictly about money, and that should come as no surprise to anyone. It’s done, and the IRL only has one way to go — up. It only makes sense for the teams, sponsors and fans to have one series to focus on.
As a fan of both series, I am happy the reunification has happened. I’m sure not all Indy-car fans like the merger (including NSSN columnist Dave Argabright), but it has finally happened, and a new era of Indy-car racing is about to start.
I would like to see the schedule fine-tuned for 2009 and retain some places where Champ Car was very successful (Long Beach, Cleveland, Toronto, Las Vegas). I am optimistic that the IRL can now evolve into a very successful and exciting series despite some of the bitterness between the two groups in the past. Some fans will never be able to forgive Tony George for what they perceive as the cause of the problem.
In the world of professional sports, time and, more importantly, big money have a way of sorting things out.

NASCAR’s Evolution

I have been watching the top division of NASCAR since the 1960s, when the only glimpse of the Grand National Division was on ABC’s Wide World of Sports. It was three or four segments of seven or eight minutes each, of a race that might have been run two months before the show. They even had phony sound tracks of tires screeching on pavement as cars slid through the grass.
Of course, in later years, that division became the Winston Cup, then Nextel Cup, then Sprint Cup; so we will call it the WNS Cup. I have read many letters in this forum over the off-season criticizing the direction of NASCAR. After watching a very exciting Daytona 500, I believe this may be the most exciting time in the history of WNS Cup.
We have already welcomed many open-wheel drivers — Sam Hornish, Jr., Juan Pablo Monotoya, Dario Franchitti, Jacques Villeneuve and Patrick Carpentier into WNS Cup. I believe in the next two years we can welcome Marco Andretti, Tony Kanaan, Helio Castroneves, Vitor Meira, Hideki Mutoh, Danica Patrick, Sebastien Bourdais, Oriol Servia, Graham Rahal, Bruno Junqueiria and many other International racing stars. Of course, the present WNS Cup owners such as Hendrick, Penske, Ganassi, Gibbs and Roush have enough money to build teams to accommodate all of these drivers but that pesky NASCAR rule limits owners to four teams each.
But the upside of that is I envision the team owners in the IRL and Champ Car World Series coming over right along with the drivers. Both the open-wheel drivers and owners will be attracted to WNS Cup because NASCAR has chosen to utilize a spec car that these folks are used to competing in. Obviously, with this infusion of open-wheel drivers and owners, some exciting changes will come about in WNS Cup.
I see some of the old, worn out tracks such as Darlington, Dover, Pocono, Michigan and, obviously, all the short tracks going by the wayside. I see more road-course racing at venues like Road Atlanta, Road America and Mid-Ohio — and additional races at Infineon and Watkins Glen. The summer race at Daytona might be run on the infield road course. And, in a few years, race courses in new U.S. markets and then, obviously, overseas markets in Asia and Europe. The opportunities are endless.
I believe that in just a few short years the drivers and owners from the IRL and Champ Car World Series can do for NASCAR’s WNS Cup series what they did for the IRL and CCWS. I can’t wait.

Hello, USAC, Are You There?

Can someone write in and tell us if the USAC office is still open? If they are, you would never know it by reading “America’s weekly motorsports authority.”  Maybe they just don’t have a marketing person on the staff.
This week, I think I saw two small mentions of the once formidable racing body buried in NSSN someplace — no major headline stating, “USAC Folly, The Speedway Silver Crown Car Is Dead.”
Well, probably that’s because USAC is apparently not dropping it. They are going to “re-evaluate” it. I would suggest to re-evaluate it in the round file — that’s where it belongs. Surely we could count the entire fan base for that car on the combined USAC management team’s fingers, right? Hopefully, enough of us former dedicated Silver Crown fans will come back so they can pay the bills, but that is yet to be seen.
I hope bringing back the old Crown cars will be a start of a turnaround for the folks at USAC — maybe they’ve been awakened. We’ll see.

C’mon, Kyle

Don’t get me wrong, Kyle Petty is a wonderful person. His dedication to the Victory Junction Gang is amazing.
But watching the Kobalt Tools 500, Kyle was three laps down at halfway. Please get out of the car, Kyle. Put Chad McCumbee in for six or seven races — get Tony Raines or Mike Skinner.
At this point, you are just an embarrassment to the Petty legacy and name. I hate to say that — I really do.