Gordon Wins Appeal, Gets Points Refunded

HAMPTON, Ga. — Tony Stewart was so upset with the Goodyear tires used in Sunday’s NASCAR Sprint Cup Kobalt Tools 500 he was fit to be “tired.”
Once again, Goodyear brought a lousy tire to the track, and that left the 43 drivers in the race at wits end trying to deal with a tire they believed was unsuitable for racing.
“I’m going to go home and take everything that has Goodyears on it, put Firestones on it and feel a lot safer,” Stewart said. “It’s just a shame that these teams that work so hard and spend so much money to compete, are all being dictated by a company incapable of building tires fit for a street car.”
Dale Earnhardt, Jr. was slightly more diplomatic in his criticism of the tire company that has an exclusive contract to serve as the sole tire supplier to NASCAR through 2012.
“It’s a reputation risk just to be in this sport as a company like that,” Earnhardt said. “They can be the quarterback sometimes on Sunday as far as criticism goes. But they do a good job.
“This was just a bad combination, this tire at this track. Just a poor combination.”
Goodyear sent a marketing official, Justin Fantozzi, in to try to defend the company’s position, but by then it was a lost cause.
“We are tremendously proud of the wear rates we saw here,” Fantozzi said. “We have a defined development for this particular tire that started in August with a test here in Atlanta.
“We’ll do the same thing we do after every race. We have post race data now, so we will go back to Akron, Ohio, and sit down with engineers and see where that leaves us for the October race. Driver comments are part of the data set we use when selecting tires, so we will gather input there as well.”
Jim Hunter, NASCAR’s vice president of corporate communications, issued a comment regarding Goodyear’s woes.
“This was only the second race on a 1.5-mile track with the new car,” Hunter said. “Goodyear always puts safety first and there were no tire failures. There’s no doubt this car is harder to drive and as a result, there’s a bigger premium on the driver’s ability.  We certainly can understand drivers being frustrated after 500 grueling miles. However, Goodyear will work with us and the teams to make things better. They always have.”
Following the Kobalt Tools 500, Ed Clark, president and general manger for Atlanta Motor Speedway, spoke with Stu Grant, general manager Global Racing Tires for Goodyear.
“Following my conversation with Stu Grant, I have pledged to make our track available to Goodyear to come to AMS on an as-needed basis to get the proper compound they need before the Oct. 26 Pep Boys Auto 500,” said Clark. “We will do everything possible from our end to help make sure that we have the best tire compound available when the Sprint Cup teams return this fall.”

• Carl Edwards had the car to beat in Sunday’s race, but it all went up in a puff of smoke when his engine blew up while leading the race on lap 274. So, instead of winning the race, he finished 42nd which ended a bad week for the driver who was penalized after last weekend’s race at Las Vegas.
Edwards admitted he was frustrated that he could have had three wins in a row before his streak of success ended.
“To win three in a row in this series is real tough,” Edwards said. “To win three out of the first four, that would have been spectacular. But I think we showed today, and we’ve shown the last couple of weeks that we’ve got a great team. Our whole team is working well together. I’m excited. It’s going to be another week just like last week where you just can’t wait to race at Bristol. I cannot wait.”
With crew chief Bob Osborne serving a six-race suspension for last week’s infraction with the oil-box lid, Roush Fenway General Manager Robbie Reiser took over as interim crew chief for Edwards.
Reiser was the longtime crew chief for Matt Kenseth.
“Robbie was alright, except for he keeps calling me Matt,” Edwards said. “I called him Bob and he said he didn’t like that, so he quit. But they did a great job. We’ve got a lot of depth in the organization and I think we showed it today by being able to go out there and run up to the front.” 

• Robby Gordon was ecstatic that the National Stock Car Racing Commission heard and considered the appeal for three penalties issued by NASCAR following opening day inspection on Feb. 8, 2008, and gave his 100 Sprint Cup championship points back. That put him back into the top 35 as he entered Sunday’s race 21st in points and left Atlanta 24th in the standings.
The Commission believed “that the facts presented during the hearing represented an extraordinary and unusual set of circumstances. While this does not excuse the infraction, the National Stock Car Racing Commission has decided to reinstate the car owner and driver championship points, lift the suspension and increase the fine.”
Crew chief Frank Kerr’s penalty was increased to $150,000 and he remains on probation through Dec. 31, 2008.
The three-man board was chaired by George Silbermann and included Doug Fritz and former team owner Bud Moore.
“I feel good about the points,” Gordon said. “The one thing you can’t buy in this world — I guess some people can buy them for the first five races — are NASCAR points and time. The money, we’ll figure out how to work through that side of it. The points are what’s important to us. The biggest thing that I still stand by is we didn’t do anything wrong.  Somebody made a mistake, and delivered us a wrong nose. We believed it was a certified part because of the 2008 rulebook, blah, blah, blah. It was a complete surprise to us when we showed up in Daytona.”

• Kitty Allison, mother of legendary NASCAR drivers Bobby and Donnie Allison, died Thursday at the age of 101.