Well, I guess we all should have been expecting this. I mean the chances of it happening were two out of three, and it was a chance of when, not if, it would finally occur. It didn’t make it any less painful, especially in the way it went about…
David was the biggest shock because he was pretty good in practice. When he ran a “borderline” lap during qualifying my heart sank, because I was already predicting that it wouldn’t be fast enough to make the show. David is a great qualifier and it made me even more worried about Michael’s chances at racing his way in and DJ’s hopes of avoiding another Champion’s Provisional. My only speck of optimism was that David went out early while Michael and Dale were further down the order, but it wasn’t a big speck and it turned out I was right in thinking that way.
As soon as I saw the NAPA Camry on the track I knew it was going to be bad. As the booth guys like to say, he was wrecking but not hitting anything the entire first and second three-quarters of the run. Poor Darrell sounded so upset the entire time and I believe he already realized how it was going to end. Michael lost it in the frontstretch and smacked the back and front of the car into the wall. The tires smoked as he spun it around and headed dejectedly into the garage without completing the second lap. That’s not how I wanted to see the NAPA car do its first burnout.
My heart was breaking for Michael, but I also couldn’t help feeling awful for DW. You could tell by the way he talked how shaken he was, and he quickly said that there was no way Michael could have qualified that car. It’s like a nightmare come true for Darrell. He’s been worried since the beginning that Michael took on too much and that he was going to become the uncompetitive driver Darrell was at the end of his career. Michael can say over and over that his plate was never too full, but it’s showing now.
Then DJ goes out and his Camry was horrible as well. The third Champ’s Provisional in three races.
MWR has a lot of work to do, but I expected that. The funny part is the way some of Michael’s fans are now reacting. Here’s an impression.
September 2006: “I can’t wait to be gone from BDR! Toyota is gonna be awesome!!”
November 2006: “Finally this season from hell is over! Bring it on 2007, Toyota will prove all those naysayers wrong!!!”
January 2007 (testing): “Um, they’re sandbagging! Toyota’s gonna be great! If Michael could make most of the races last year in BDR crap, he’ll have no trouble at all in awesome Toyotas!”
Fast forward to March 9th, 2007: “Toyota better step it up and start giving MWR good equipment!!!!!”
It just makes me laugh. Look, MWR is a brand new team that was hurriedly put together and hasn’t even really been a united organization until very recently (just watch MWR: A New Era—they were separated into three different buildings while Waltrip Racing World was finished…actually, I don’t even know if everyone is under the same roof yet!). Two out of the three teams don’t have a guaranteed spot. That’s an immediate disadvantage no matter what organization you’re driving for. Toyota is a new Cup manufacturer. They struggled in the CTS at first too, why did so many Michael fans think they’d come out swinging in Cup, with the competition as tough as it is today? It is what it is. We as fans can’t do much but suck it up and go on to next weekend. DJ is still in the race—one car is better than none, and if he can pull off a couple more decent finishes he won’t have to worry about relying on his provisionals, which is a very good thing!
Brandon’s run bummed me out because he was fairly good in practice. Here are some notes:
“It didn’t feel bad. It’s never a good thing when the car feels good because you’re comfortable side. At least we unloaded better and we had a better practice. We picked up again in qualifying but everybody else is. We’ll go home and regroup, take some time off and see what happens.”
WHAT IS THE NEXT RACE ON YOUR SCHEUDLE? “I don’t know. I think it’s going to be a while. We’ve really got a lot of work ahead of us before we should come back and try to attempt it. We’ll see what happens and hopefully when we come back we’ll be better.”
ARE YOU GOING TO HAVE THE OPPORTUNITY TO TEST OR GO TO THE WIND TUNNEL? “That’s the stuff that we really need to do and we know that. We need to be spending time at the wind tunnel. We need to spend time at Kentucky, we need to be doing this and doing that and we may have jumped in a little too fast. With the competition the way it us you can’t come in behind the eight-ball.”
I’m definitely glad he had a good practice if nothing else! I think this team can make a few races this year if they keep working as hard as they have been so far. They’ve been making such a wonderful effort and get a little better every week.
Thankfully Kurt had a great qualifying time and will start his home track race in 10th as long as the rest of the practices go well (since both the Busch and Cup practices today were filled with wrecks, I don’t say that was much confidence!). It would be great if Kurt could win at Vegas! With the way Penske’s intermediate program has improved with Dodge’s new nose, I have high hopes for the Blue Deuce.
Dale Jr. and Martin struggled a bit, ending up 28th and 26th, respectively. But at least they didn’t wreck like Paul Menard! That was absolutely wild!
Finally, I continue to fret about Casey’s Cup team. 34th.
Fortunately Busch quals were better. Kurt in 4th, Casey in 8th and David in 25th.
Ohhh I just hope something good happens this weekend to cheer me up! At this point I just don’t want to see anyone wreck anymore.
David was the biggest shock because he was pretty good in practice. When he ran a “borderline” lap during qualifying my heart sank, because I was already predicting that it wouldn’t be fast enough to make the show. David is a great qualifier and it made me even more worried about Michael’s chances at racing his way in and DJ’s hopes of avoiding another Champion’s Provisional. My only speck of optimism was that David went out early while Michael and Dale were further down the order, but it wasn’t a big speck and it turned out I was right in thinking that way.
As soon as I saw the NAPA Camry on the track I knew it was going to be bad. As the booth guys like to say, he was wrecking but not hitting anything the entire first and second three-quarters of the run. Poor Darrell sounded so upset the entire time and I believe he already realized how it was going to end. Michael lost it in the frontstretch and smacked the back and front of the car into the wall. The tires smoked as he spun it around and headed dejectedly into the garage without completing the second lap. That’s not how I wanted to see the NAPA car do its first burnout.
My heart was breaking for Michael, but I also couldn’t help feeling awful for DW. You could tell by the way he talked how shaken he was, and he quickly said that there was no way Michael could have qualified that car. It’s like a nightmare come true for Darrell. He’s been worried since the beginning that Michael took on too much and that he was going to become the uncompetitive driver Darrell was at the end of his career. Michael can say over and over that his plate was never too full, but it’s showing now.
Then DJ goes out and his Camry was horrible as well. The third Champ’s Provisional in three races.
MWR has a lot of work to do, but I expected that. The funny part is the way some of Michael’s fans are now reacting. Here’s an impression.
September 2006: “I can’t wait to be gone from BDR! Toyota is gonna be awesome!!”
November 2006: “Finally this season from hell is over! Bring it on 2007, Toyota will prove all those naysayers wrong!!!”
January 2007 (testing): “Um, they’re sandbagging! Toyota’s gonna be great! If Michael could make most of the races last year in BDR crap, he’ll have no trouble at all in awesome Toyotas!”
Fast forward to March 9th, 2007: “Toyota better step it up and start giving MWR good equipment!!!!!”
It just makes me laugh. Look, MWR is a brand new team that was hurriedly put together and hasn’t even really been a united organization until very recently (just watch MWR: A New Era—they were separated into three different buildings while Waltrip Racing World was finished…actually, I don’t even know if everyone is under the same roof yet!). Two out of the three teams don’t have a guaranteed spot. That’s an immediate disadvantage no matter what organization you’re driving for. Toyota is a new Cup manufacturer. They struggled in the CTS at first too, why did so many Michael fans think they’d come out swinging in Cup, with the competition as tough as it is today? It is what it is. We as fans can’t do much but suck it up and go on to next weekend. DJ is still in the race—one car is better than none, and if he can pull off a couple more decent finishes he won’t have to worry about relying on his provisionals, which is a very good thing!
Brandon’s run bummed me out because he was fairly good in practice. Here are some notes:
“It didn’t feel bad. It’s never a good thing when the car feels good because you’re comfortable side. At least we unloaded better and we had a better practice. We picked up again in qualifying but everybody else is. We’ll go home and regroup, take some time off and see what happens.”
WHAT IS THE NEXT RACE ON YOUR SCHEUDLE? “I don’t know. I think it’s going to be a while. We’ve really got a lot of work ahead of us before we should come back and try to attempt it. We’ll see what happens and hopefully when we come back we’ll be better.”
ARE YOU GOING TO HAVE THE OPPORTUNITY TO TEST OR GO TO THE WIND TUNNEL? “That’s the stuff that we really need to do and we know that. We need to be spending time at the wind tunnel. We need to spend time at Kentucky, we need to be doing this and doing that and we may have jumped in a little too fast. With the competition the way it us you can’t come in behind the eight-ball.”
I’m definitely glad he had a good practice if nothing else! I think this team can make a few races this year if they keep working as hard as they have been so far. They’ve been making such a wonderful effort and get a little better every week.
Thankfully Kurt had a great qualifying time and will start his home track race in 10th as long as the rest of the practices go well (since both the Busch and Cup practices today were filled with wrecks, I don’t say that was much confidence!). It would be great if Kurt could win at Vegas! With the way Penske’s intermediate program has improved with Dodge’s new nose, I have high hopes for the Blue Deuce.
Dale Jr. and Martin struggled a bit, ending up 28th and 26th, respectively. But at least they didn’t wreck like Paul Menard! That was absolutely wild!
Finally, I continue to fret about Casey’s Cup team. 34th.
Fortunately Busch quals were better. Kurt in 4th, Casey in 8th and David in 25th.
Ohhh I just hope something good happens this weekend to cheer me up! At this point I just don’t want to see anyone wreck anymore.