Nicorette 300 and Kobalt Tools 500 - Atlanta Motor Speedway
The Nicorette 300 was a nail-biter for many of the Busch teams concerned about tires problems, but for our heroes the race was either a huge success or a bitter letdown.
Very few laps were behind the field when the caution came out for a wreck—Michael Waltrip’s wreck. I must be getting stony in regards to Michael because I felt nothing but a dull disappointment. What made it worse was that it was basically Michael’s fault. He loves the high groove, but the high groove doesn’t always love him, and this time it decided to reach out and give the #32 Camping World Camry a good slap. It was too early to be going as close to the wall as he was on a greenish track, the commentators said, and I agreed with a sigh. I never pretend that my drivers can’t do anything wrong, but it still hurts when you have to admit they screwed up. Things got crappier when Michael brought out the second caution when a tire blew after some quick repairs. That was it for him—16 laps into the race Michael brought the beaten and bruised Toyota to the garage and finished a heartbreaking 43rd.
Both Casey and David had a very good day, quietly racing and ending up 9th and 13th, respectively. No doubt Casey was thrilled to have a run like that and actually get the finish to show it! David moved up a spot in drivers points to 11th and now he’s 13th in owners points! A good solid start to the season.
Of course the race wouldn’t be interesting if it didn’t have a little controversy. Unfortunately this incident involved Todd Kluever, who I’ve grown to be quite the fan of over the years. Todd had a good car but got trapped a lap down because of green flag pit stops, and with a little over two dozen laps to go he was in the position to get the Aaron’s Lucky Dog. The man he was racing with was Sam Hornish Jr., who I’ve not taken much of a notice of (I’m not all crazy about drivers from other series coming in…so what? They’re just drivers) until now. Hornish was fast, faster than Todd, and got up to his back bumper coming off of Turn 2. However, instead of passing Todd cleanly, he plowed—I mean plowed!—into him! On the straightaway, of all places! I was borderline insane with fury, and that intensified when NASCAR gave Hornish the lap back, with no aggressive driving penalty or anything. For one thing, I thought that if you were involved in the caution you were disallowed the free pass, and for another that was some blatant rough driving if I’ve ever seen any. Hornish waltzed his way to 15th while Todd was sat with bloody 33rd and a wrecked racecar. He was none too happy about it, either!
“We were trying to salvage a good finish for the 3M car,” he said. “We had a pretty good car. We started off real tight and we were fighting hard to stay the Lucky Dog there and get a caution, and the 12 car didn't think that was necessary. It was only a matter of time, a couple of more laps and he was going to pass me because his tires were better, but I guess he didn't want to pass us, he just wanted to wreck us.”
I had high hopes for the Kobalt 500. Kurt’s intermediate track program has improved a ton since last year and so has DEI’s. I thought that this could be the race that Casey would break out of his bad luck streak with and that David and DJ would get a pair of solid finishes to better their points standings. A few of these things came true and a few definitely did not.
When the race began I had already been listening to David’s radio feed on PitCommand for a while. I’d first listened to him during the Duel and really enjoyed the experience before he had engine problems and dropped out of the race. Since I work every other weekend, this was the first time I’d gotten a chance to listen to him (since he missed the race at Vegas). The first thing I noticed was that Frankie Kerr, David and Shawn Reutimann all have an amazing amount of chemistry. Frankie is a wonderful crew chief and a perfect fit with David. Shawn is a terrific spotter, great at giving David just the information he needs and with a calm, clear voice. I settled down to listen.
When the green fell, David began to drop back as a result of an ill-handling car. 36 laps later the caution flew for debris and the Domino’s team got their first chance at adjustments. However, this pit road trip ended up providing me with David’s first F-bomb! Apparently he had trouble seeing his pit board and told the crew that next week he “needs another fucking pit sign!” (Hey, that’s what he said!). I know everyone cusses, but it was almost comical hearing it from David’s lips, since he’s such a sweetheart. It seemed like he felt bad about it later because after he was back on the track he added (in a bit of a calmer voice) that he wanted another one for the next pit stop. I don’t think he got one, though, for when he pitted again he told the crew to wave the freaking thing around so he could spot it easier.
Atlanta is Atlanta, and because of green flag pit stops and a grumpy car David wound up 2 laps down. He was still able to reach about the high 20s, though, and his Camry was just starting to get a little better when disaster struck. David was running the high line behind fellow Toyota driver Brian Vickers when Greg Biffle drifted up to “get a little air off of the 83 because we were side-by-side” the second David crept down just a little bit (looking at the replay he was very close to the wall). As a result of this synchronized movement the front of the 00 Camry hooked the right rear of Biffle’s Ford, which slammed into the wall and collected Vickers. Kasey Kahne slammed David from behind and spun him around so that the two cars were facing each other.
“I don’t know what the freak happened,” David said in disbelief. He was quick to put the blame on himself, though, if it was indeed his fault. Both Frankie and Shawn said that it wasn’t, that Biffle came up. I felt so bad for David—he sounded so bummed. However, I was incredibly impressed with Frankie. That man took charge and began to bark out orders like crazy because he wanted to “finish this thing”. David took two trips for repairs and although the injured car was handling horribly and also having some plug wire problems (David said), the team set out to avoid a DNF. Radio issues began to plague Shawn, so Frankie became a temporary spotter. Now the team impressed me further, for not only did Frankie do an excellent job, but he also had the spirits to tease Shawn about the “hell of a job” the crew chief was doing as a spotter! Shawn’s replies were mostly static until the very end of the race. After the checkers David again brought up the wreck and told them to tell him straight up if he caused it. They again affirmed it was not his fault. David finished 40th but moved up a spot in drivers points to 43rd and remains 44th in owners points.
Unfortunately Biffle blamed the wreck on David. “The 00 right-reared me at the end of the backstretch and turned me in the fence. I guess it’s payback from California, I don’t know. He must have been splitting the difference or something and got my right-rear, I don’t know. Maybe he didn’t mean to do it, but those are the facts.”
I think this is ridiculous and Biffle should have a talk with David before he brings up payback. David has too much to lose to think about revenge right now!
Kurt Busch had a great car, leading 14 laps, but was bitten by a mistake on pit road with a little more than 100 laps to go, which he never recovered from. He sped on pit lane during yellow flag pit stops and couldn’t get the blue deuce back into the top 10 from there. He finished a solid 14th, but that number doesn’t show how good that team was all day.
Casey Mears had another dismal day. According to the fans who listened to his audio feed today (on his forum), the car was just horrible at first. I don’t think it ever got very good, but he was better near the end of the race and Darian was saying that they learned a lot of things. I sure hope so, because even though Casey finished 28th and moved up a spot in points to 32nd, he’s still frighteningly close to the 35th mark.
Both Dale Jr. and Martin had good days, finishing 14th and 8th, respectively. Dale Jr. had an awesome, top 5 car until a bad adjustment messed up the handling and he dropped back. Martin’s run was just amazing—he could win one of these things soon! Martin is now 22nd in points and Junior is 26th…not incredibly good but way better than they were a couple races ago!!
Jimmie Johnson won the race after a great battle with Tony Stewart, making it an impressive two in a row (I was cheering for Jimmie, by the way). Congratulations to that #48 team!
On to the bullring of Bristol and the Car of Tomorrow!
Very few laps were behind the field when the caution came out for a wreck—Michael Waltrip’s wreck. I must be getting stony in regards to Michael because I felt nothing but a dull disappointment. What made it worse was that it was basically Michael’s fault. He loves the high groove, but the high groove doesn’t always love him, and this time it decided to reach out and give the #32 Camping World Camry a good slap. It was too early to be going as close to the wall as he was on a greenish track, the commentators said, and I agreed with a sigh. I never pretend that my drivers can’t do anything wrong, but it still hurts when you have to admit they screwed up. Things got crappier when Michael brought out the second caution when a tire blew after some quick repairs. That was it for him—16 laps into the race Michael brought the beaten and bruised Toyota to the garage and finished a heartbreaking 43rd.
Both Casey and David had a very good day, quietly racing and ending up 9th and 13th, respectively. No doubt Casey was thrilled to have a run like that and actually get the finish to show it! David moved up a spot in drivers points to 11th and now he’s 13th in owners points! A good solid start to the season.
Of course the race wouldn’t be interesting if it didn’t have a little controversy. Unfortunately this incident involved Todd Kluever, who I’ve grown to be quite the fan of over the years. Todd had a good car but got trapped a lap down because of green flag pit stops, and with a little over two dozen laps to go he was in the position to get the Aaron’s Lucky Dog. The man he was racing with was Sam Hornish Jr., who I’ve not taken much of a notice of (I’m not all crazy about drivers from other series coming in…so what? They’re just drivers) until now. Hornish was fast, faster than Todd, and got up to his back bumper coming off of Turn 2. However, instead of passing Todd cleanly, he plowed—I mean plowed!—into him! On the straightaway, of all places! I was borderline insane with fury, and that intensified when NASCAR gave Hornish the lap back, with no aggressive driving penalty or anything. For one thing, I thought that if you were involved in the caution you were disallowed the free pass, and for another that was some blatant rough driving if I’ve ever seen any. Hornish waltzed his way to 15th while Todd was sat with bloody 33rd and a wrecked racecar. He was none too happy about it, either!
“We were trying to salvage a good finish for the 3M car,” he said. “We had a pretty good car. We started off real tight and we were fighting hard to stay the Lucky Dog there and get a caution, and the 12 car didn't think that was necessary. It was only a matter of time, a couple of more laps and he was going to pass me because his tires were better, but I guess he didn't want to pass us, he just wanted to wreck us.”
I had high hopes for the Kobalt 500. Kurt’s intermediate track program has improved a ton since last year and so has DEI’s. I thought that this could be the race that Casey would break out of his bad luck streak with and that David and DJ would get a pair of solid finishes to better their points standings. A few of these things came true and a few definitely did not.
When the race began I had already been listening to David’s radio feed on PitCommand for a while. I’d first listened to him during the Duel and really enjoyed the experience before he had engine problems and dropped out of the race. Since I work every other weekend, this was the first time I’d gotten a chance to listen to him (since he missed the race at Vegas). The first thing I noticed was that Frankie Kerr, David and Shawn Reutimann all have an amazing amount of chemistry. Frankie is a wonderful crew chief and a perfect fit with David. Shawn is a terrific spotter, great at giving David just the information he needs and with a calm, clear voice. I settled down to listen.
When the green fell, David began to drop back as a result of an ill-handling car. 36 laps later the caution flew for debris and the Domino’s team got their first chance at adjustments. However, this pit road trip ended up providing me with David’s first F-bomb! Apparently he had trouble seeing his pit board and told the crew that next week he “needs another fucking pit sign!” (Hey, that’s what he said!). I know everyone cusses, but it was almost comical hearing it from David’s lips, since he’s such a sweetheart. It seemed like he felt bad about it later because after he was back on the track he added (in a bit of a calmer voice) that he wanted another one for the next pit stop. I don’t think he got one, though, for when he pitted again he told the crew to wave the freaking thing around so he could spot it easier.
Atlanta is Atlanta, and because of green flag pit stops and a grumpy car David wound up 2 laps down. He was still able to reach about the high 20s, though, and his Camry was just starting to get a little better when disaster struck. David was running the high line behind fellow Toyota driver Brian Vickers when Greg Biffle drifted up to “get a little air off of the 83 because we were side-by-side” the second David crept down just a little bit (looking at the replay he was very close to the wall). As a result of this synchronized movement the front of the 00 Camry hooked the right rear of Biffle’s Ford, which slammed into the wall and collected Vickers. Kasey Kahne slammed David from behind and spun him around so that the two cars were facing each other.
“I don’t know what the freak happened,” David said in disbelief. He was quick to put the blame on himself, though, if it was indeed his fault. Both Frankie and Shawn said that it wasn’t, that Biffle came up. I felt so bad for David—he sounded so bummed. However, I was incredibly impressed with Frankie. That man took charge and began to bark out orders like crazy because he wanted to “finish this thing”. David took two trips for repairs and although the injured car was handling horribly and also having some plug wire problems (David said), the team set out to avoid a DNF. Radio issues began to plague Shawn, so Frankie became a temporary spotter. Now the team impressed me further, for not only did Frankie do an excellent job, but he also had the spirits to tease Shawn about the “hell of a job” the crew chief was doing as a spotter! Shawn’s replies were mostly static until the very end of the race. After the checkers David again brought up the wreck and told them to tell him straight up if he caused it. They again affirmed it was not his fault. David finished 40th but moved up a spot in drivers points to 43rd and remains 44th in owners points.
Unfortunately Biffle blamed the wreck on David. “The 00 right-reared me at the end of the backstretch and turned me in the fence. I guess it’s payback from California, I don’t know. He must have been splitting the difference or something and got my right-rear, I don’t know. Maybe he didn’t mean to do it, but those are the facts.”
I think this is ridiculous and Biffle should have a talk with David before he brings up payback. David has too much to lose to think about revenge right now!
Kurt Busch had a great car, leading 14 laps, but was bitten by a mistake on pit road with a little more than 100 laps to go, which he never recovered from. He sped on pit lane during yellow flag pit stops and couldn’t get the blue deuce back into the top 10 from there. He finished a solid 14th, but that number doesn’t show how good that team was all day.
Casey Mears had another dismal day. According to the fans who listened to his audio feed today (on his forum), the car was just horrible at first. I don’t think it ever got very good, but he was better near the end of the race and Darian was saying that they learned a lot of things. I sure hope so, because even though Casey finished 28th and moved up a spot in points to 32nd, he’s still frighteningly close to the 35th mark.
Both Dale Jr. and Martin had good days, finishing 14th and 8th, respectively. Dale Jr. had an awesome, top 5 car until a bad adjustment messed up the handling and he dropped back. Martin’s run was just amazing—he could win one of these things soon! Martin is now 22nd in points and Junior is 26th…not incredibly good but way better than they were a couple races ago!!
Jimmie Johnson won the race after a great battle with Tony Stewart, making it an impressive two in a row (I was cheering for Jimmie, by the way). Congratulations to that #48 team!
On to the bullring of Bristol and the Car of Tomorrow!
