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Thursday, June 15, 2006
DID YOU
Bill Elliott won five of the
six races at Michigan
International Speedway
from 1985-1987.
THIS WEEK
Race: 3M Performance 400
Where: Michigan International
When: Sunday, 1 p.m. ET
Television: Fox
Defending race winner: Greg Biffle
A father’s
influence
Many NASCAR drivers credit
their dads in helping their careers
ByRICKMINTER
Cox News Service
Atlanta
T he Nextel Cup circuit will celebrate Father’s Day
at Michigan International Speedway with the
running of the 3M Performance 400 and nearly
every driver in the field will be there, thanks to the ef
forts of their fathers.
Some drivers, including Dale Earnhardt Jr., Dale
Jarrett and Kyle Petty, followed their fathers’tire tracks
to NASCAR’s elite circuit.
Earnhardt Jr. will honor his father and grandfather,
Ralph Earnhardt, with a special paint scheme for the
race.
Others, including Carl Edwards, Reed Sorenson and
Kurt and Kyle Busch, also had dads who raced in lower
circuits and influenced their sons’ careers.
Kyle Busch said his father, Tbm Busch, who is the
spotter for Travis
Kvapil, sacrificed
mudi for his sons to
become racers.
“It has been every
thing any boy could
ask for,” Busch said.
“He stopped his racing
career in order to
allow me to pursue
mine, and he worked
awfiol hard to raise the
money we needed to
get going.”
Busch said his fa
ther gave him a-car
and taught him how to
make it run fast.
“He has been the
main guy, besides my
brother, who taught
me everything I know,” he said. “Being able to watch my
dad race throughout the years is where I started learn
ing what I needed to do. He taught us how the race car
works and what it needs to go fast. He was always very
hands-on.”
Carl Edwards’mother, Nancy Sterling, is more visible
around the tracks than his father and helped him fi
nance his first racing ventures. But it was his father,
Carl Edwards Sr., who taught him racing lessons he
hasn’t forgotten.
“Everybody talks about my mom because she’s
around a lot, but my dad is probably the smartest racer
that I kn,ow,” Edwards said. “Fve met a lot of people
MICHIGAN
INTERNATIONAL
SPEEDWAY
Track length: 2 miles
Race length: 200 laps/400 miles
Banking in corners; 18 degrees
Banking frontstretch: 12 degrees
Banking backstretch: 5 degrees
Frontstretch: 3,600 feet
Backstretch: 2,242 feet
Seating capacity: 137,243
First race: June 15, 1969; Motor
State 500
Qualifying record: Ryan Newman,
Dodge; 194.232 mph; June 17, 2005
Race record: Dale Jarrett, Ford;
173.997 mph; June 13, 1999
Hendrick Motorsports driver Kyie Busch
(shown with his father Tom in 2004) says his
dad sacrificed plenty to help establish his
career and the career of his brother Kurt, who
drives for Penske Racing South. Many drivers
on the Cup circuit attribute their success to their
fathers’ efforts.
since I’ve been here in NASCAR, but I don’t think any
body Fve met has the ability to criticaUy think like my
dad, and I think that’s something he really helped me
with a lot.”
Edwards said his father, who raced mostly four-cylin
der cars on dirt tracks in Missouri, taught him to be self-
critical and not make excuses.
“There’s always a reason for everything happening,
whether it was mechanical or emotional in a race car or
mistakes you make,” he said. “He was real cut and dried
on that stuff.”
Edwards said that racing also helped him make a
connection with his father, who is divorced from his
mother, that he otherwise might not have made.
“My dad and I didn’t really do that much together,
didn’t hang out,” he said. “I didn’t know him as a person
until we started racing together and then, when we did,
it was like we were togeldier all the time, racing every
where together and traveling.
“That was pretty cool.”
Catching up with...
Mark
Martin
Mark Martin, third in Nextel Cup
points after a 17th-place finish at Pocono
on Sunday, is set to retire from full-time
Nextel Cup competition at the end of the
season and become a regular in the
Craftsman Truck Series, where he has
three victories in six starts this season. He
recently spoke with Cox News Service re
porter Jeff Hood about his change of pace.
Q. What about Tidd Kluever taking
over Martin’s No. 6 car in 2007?
A. “I feel like we have hot given Tbdd a
chance to show what his true potential is.
But we’ve got to get there pretty soon. He’s
a very solid guy. He’s a really good driver
and a really good person. There’s still
time, but we’ve got to get on the stick and
give him an opportunity to rise to the oc-
NASCAR
Mark Martin (left) and team owner
Jack Roush talk to the media
following Martin’s third truck victory in
2006 at Dover.
Q. How big a deal is it to win at
Michigan, the backyard of the auto manu
facturers?
A. “Only if you don’t. If you do, it’s not a
big deal. ... We’ve won there a bunch of
times and it really wasn’t a big deal. But
going into it, they make a big deal out of
it.”
Q. How is your son Matt doing with his
Late Model racing career?
A. “He’s comir^ along OK He’s just 14.
He’s got a good bit of talent. He doesn’t
race a lot, but races some. He makes
progress with every race.”
Q. What did you think about Kyle
Busch tossing his HANS device at Casey
Mears’No. 42 Dodge at Charlotte?
A. “I don’t think it was that big of a deal.
It was a big deal because of who did it and
his history. That’s what the big deal was.”
Q. How different is it competing in the
Cr^tsman Truck Series? '
A “The racing is more like it used to be.
It’s the best racing in NASCAR right now.
It’s the least spoiled by commercialism. It
feels veiy pure.”
Q. How do you maintain such a hectic
schedule?
A “I put my foot down this year and
said no triple-headers. I did that in
November at Homestead. It’s not the rac
ing. It’s the drivers meetings, qualifying,
practice sessions. You take all that out,
and Fd do triple-headers every weekend.”
Rick Minter’s
OBSERVATIONS
Here are some of the top storylines this week heading to Michigan;
Crews try to ignore changes behind the wheel
Last week’s news that Brian Vickers wants out at Hendrick Motorsports
and that Casey Mears won’t be returning to Chip Ganassi Racing aren’t sur
prising given the frequency with which NASCAR drivers swap rides these
days. But what often doesn’t come to Light is how the driver’s decision affects
the crew left behind.
Mears’ crew chief, Dormie Wingo, and his No. 42 team found out last July
that Jamie McMmray was leaving for Roush Racing. This year, Mears is va
cating the ride.
Wingo told reporters at Pocono Raceway that he and his crew of veteran
mechanics simply have to keep working and hope for the best.
“Bottom line, you come here to race every week and you’ve got to put aside
all this other stuff that goes on and just go do your job,” he said. “It’s tough.
When you go home and sit down and think about it, you get pretty [upset],
but there’s really nothing else you can do about it.”
It’s not like Wingo’s team isn’t competitive. The last two years they’ve en
tered the last race before the Chase for the Nextel Cup (Richmond) either
10th or 11th in points. The top 10 drivers following Richmond compete in the
Chase for the Nextel Cup, but McMurray wasn’t able to make the cut either
year.
Wingo said it’s not because his crew hasn’t worked hard.
“We just haven’t been able to get there,” he said. ‘We’re not going to give
up. I think we’ve got a top-10 race team. We’ve been on the verge of it year
after year.”
Perseverance pays oflf for Hamlin’s team
The black duct tape flapping off the rear comer of Denny Hamlin’s No. 11
Chevrolet as he sped across the finish line to win the Pocono 500 at Pocono
Raceway proves that it pays for pit
crews to persevere, even though the
situation looks discouraging.
Hamhn, the race pole-sitter, was
cruising at the head of the pack a qioar-
ter of the way throu^ the race when
he blew a left-rear tire, spun off the
track and damaged the aerodynamics
of his car. But his Mike Ford-led crew
brought Hamlin to the pits numerous
times, making repairs to the car while
keeping the driver on the lead lap.
It all paid off as Hamlin, a rookie,
lined up 40th, sped through the pack,
took the lead from Greg Biffle and
scored his first points-paying victory in
NASCAR’s Cup series in just his 21st
start. (He won the non-points Budweiser Shootout at Daytona in February.)
‘We had a dilemma early,” Ford told TV reporters during the race.
“Everybody stayed calm and worked through it.”
Hamlin’s victory moved him from 11th to ninth in points.
Preparation key to double-duty weekends
The key to successfully running a Nextel Cup race at one track and a
Busch Series race at another on the same weekend appears to be the prepa
ration of the Busch car while the driver is at the Cup track attending to pri
mary obligations there.
Last week Carl Edwards flew to Nashville Superspeedway, hopped into his
No. 60 Ford and drove away from the field to win the Federated Auto Parts
300.
He said the hard work done by his stand-in driver, Hank Parker Jr., and
his crew chief, Pierre Kuettel, was key to his victory.
“It made the whole double-duty thing easy,” Edwards said. “All I had to do
was show up and drive the car.”
The stand-in roles might appear to be thankless ones, but drivers in search
ofacareer jump-start seem glad to take them.
Kertus Davis, who has spent the bulk of his brief Busch career driving his
father’s woefully underfunded No. 0 Chevrolet, got to drive the Joe Gibbs
Racing No. 20 Chevrolet for Denny Hamlin. Davis was fifth fastest in the
opening practice at Nashville, despite taking great care not to crash the car.
“It’s like getting into a Cadillac compared to what Fm used to getting into,”
he said, adding that he hopes his brief performance as a fift-in driver for
Hamlin, who finished fourth at Nashville, will lead to a better ride down the
NASCAR road,
“I feel like a lot of people know what I’m capable of doing if I’m in the right,
equipment,” Davis said. “I think we showed that.”
Hard times for some top drivers
There are several drivera considered to be solid contenders for the champi
onship in danger of not making the cut for the Chase for the Nextel Cup,
which begins after the Sept. 9 race at Richmond.
Former Chase participants Kurt Busch, Ryan Newman, Elliott Sadler and
Jeremy Mayfield all are in danger of not being amo:^ the 10 drivers who will
compete for the title over the final 10 races of the season.
Busch is 17th in the standings, 663 points behind leader Jimmie Johnson.
Newman is 18th, 708 back; Sadler 20th, 740 back; and Mayfield, who made '
the Chase in 2004 and 2005, is hopelessly out of the hunt in the 32nd spot,
964 points behind the leader.
Four-time Cup champion Jeff Gordon, who missed the Chase last year,
was in the top 10 in points before a hard crash in the closing laps at Pocono.
He enters this week’s race at Michigan llth in the standings.
Hamlin; Pocono winner
Spotlight on...
Calc Gale
The 21-year-old son of veteran Late Model
driver Bubba Gale, Cale made his Busch Series
debut Saturday in the
B Federated Auto Parts 300
at Nashville Speedway. „
The Mobile, Ala., native Busch debut at Nashville
drove James Finch’s No. 1 Speedway, finishing
Dodge and was fastest in 20th in James Finch’s
GALE
Cale Gale made his
practice. He qualified 10th |^q ■] Dodoe
and finished 20th. He ' ® '
spoke with Cox News Service writer Rick Minter at the
track.
On his preparation for his Busch debut: “We ran the ARCA
race at Nashville [in April] and tested at the Milwaukee MOe.
That went pretty well. I feel pretty good about everything so far,”
On making it to one of NASCAR’s three elite series: “I’ve been trainii^ my
whole life to race. That’s aU I ever wanted to do, and it’s all I’ve ever done. I want
it really bad. Fm 21 now, and Fve been racing since I was four. Let’s go see what
Fve got.”
On making his debut in a front-running car; “Running your first race in good
eqmpment is definitely better than trying to struggle and make it on your own.
James [Finch] had obviously seen something he liked in me.”
On his name: “I was named for Cale Yarborough. My dad was a big Cale
Yarborough fan, so it kind of went together with my last name. My dad had me
destined to race my whole life. I was bom to race.”
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