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March 13, 2007

No Call No One is Talking About
Making the Grade-Las Vegas Motor Speedway
By Dennis Michelsen

In other sports I understand the concept of the officials being part of the field of play. If the ball hits the ref, the game goes on and the ball is still in play no matter which direction the ball bounces. But in NASCAR should an official affect the outcome of the race? During one of the final caution flags of the UAW-Daimler Chrysler 400 an official changed the outcome of the race by catching a tire from the No. 48 car that was leaving his pit box. Perhaps Hendrick paid him off to catch the tire to avoid another penalty!

F for Goodyear
Harder tires in the name of race safety my ear! There were a record number of caution flags in the Busch race on Saturday and some hard hits for the guys on Sunday too. The main reason for 90% of the caution flags was a lack of grip by the tires! Goodyear should do much better than this or lose this contract!

D for NASCAR Statistics
Neither race over the weekend was all that great except for the great finish in the Busch race. But checking the NASCAR statistics you would have thought we had the most amazing Cup race in recent years…an instant Classic for the ages! For the record we had a record sixteen different leaders and an amazing twenty-eight lead changes…WOW! But only six of those lead changes took place on the track during green flag runs hardly much of a record for a four hundred mile race.

C for Jon Wood
As Mike Joy said on the race broadcast on Fox, perhaps the best compliment of Jon Wood's performance in the race on Sunday at Las Vegas is that the announcers didn't mention his name. Since he isn't driving for a name sponsor the only ways to earn air time would be to cause a crash or to lead the race. Not a bad debut to Nextel Cup racing.

B for Mark Martin
It is NOT time to retire Mr. Martin; you are leading the point's standings! Mark Martin is the only driver to post top five finishes in all three races. If you tried to lay a bet before Daytona on that being the case after three races of the season you would have made millions! His consistency has let Ginn Racing build their program to a quality team a lot faster.

A for Jimmie Johnson
Jimmie deserves extra credit for this win since he is not known as a driver that handles a loose car well. But the No. 48 team was strong enough to rally from a pit road penalty early in the event when a tire got away from their talented pit crew. A NASCAR official saved Johnson a second penalty and it would have been exciting to see the best car have to come from the back again with just forty laps to go.