Bickle's back with top-10 showing at Memphis

MILLINGTON, Tenn. -- A new-look Rich Bickle showed his competitive fire Saturday in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series' O'Reilly Auto Parts 200 at Memphis Motorsports Park.

	Rich Bickle Credit: ASP

Bickle has used most of the last nine months to get himself into better shape than he's been in since he was in high school, along with cultivating a successful hot rod and antique car restoration business using his Bickle-Smith Motorsports shops.

But he had not raced since ST Motorsports released him from its NASCAR Busch Series No. 59 Kingsford Chevrolet in September 2001. At the end of last season, a lot of people might have thought Bickle's driving career in NASCAR's national touring series was over.

But after a competitive sixth-place finish Saturday in his debut run in Billy Ballew's No. 15 Dickies Ford -- a truck Bickle himself built in 1998, when he drove in three races for Ballew -- proved there might be some wins left in the Edgerton, Wis., driver.

At worst, Bickle, 41, who showed up at Memphis a svelte 195 lbs. -- nearly 50 lbs. less than his lifetime high -- showed he could still get the job done.

A driver change after seven races this season, from popular but inexperienced Raybestos Rookie of the Year candidate Trent Owens to Bickle; created some unrest between the sponsor and the race team.

But Bickle's two-day performance, which included the truck's best qualifying (10th) and race finishes in the last two seasons, was an eye-opener for all concerned.

"The whole deal this weekend was to come up here and see if we could get this thing turned around a little bit -- and we've got a good start," Bickle said. "It's one of those things where the whole story is you've to walk before you can run and damn, if we weren't at least trotting."

Bickle's last Truck Series start had come in 1999, when he drove the same truck in one of two races he started. His best season in the series was 1997, when he won his three career victories for Darrell Waltrip Motorsports and finished second in the championship to Jack Sprague.

"We've just to do a little bit of work on some things (and) this thing will be competitive," Bickle said. "At least we'll be pretty good on the shorter places (although) the speedways, I don't know. I don't know what their speedway trucks are like, but this is the same truck I actually built back in 1998 and ran in three or four races, so it's fun to get back in my old stuff -- and kinda ironic how things comes around.

"I haven't run a truck since 1999, but truck, car, bicycle, snowmobile -- it don't make a difference -- it's the same old thing. I know I could jump back on my motocross bike and probably ride the hell out of that."

While Bickle, who has somewhere in the neighborhood of 400 career Late Model victories at tracks all over the country, was back at the front where he was used to running, the most noticeable thing about him was his lack of weight.

He said he graduated from high school at 161 lbs., but in one year jumped to 225 and had not been below it since then. After 200 laps on a 90-plus degree day he was none the worse for wear.

"One thing I am happy about," he said. "I have been working out hard for the last year-and-a-half and I didn't have no (air) hoses in that thing today and it was pretty hot out there today. I sweated pretty good but gee -- I feel great.

"It was a good day. All the guys did a good job and like I say, we've got to do that trot thing, first. We turned this thing around a little bit and everybody's in higher spirits. The sponsor should be a little happier."

Bickle had his first opportunity to work with the team's two new main elements, young crew chief Billy Rhine and chassis specialist Buddy "Red Dog" Barnes -- who worked on Rusty Wallace's 1989 Winston Cup championship team.

"I had never worked with this crew before and never worked with Red Dog and everything went smooth this weekend," Bickle said. "We made five changes on the truck and four of 'em helped it and one didn't. I had more fun today than I did the whole last year with the 59 car.

"That's why you haven't seen me racing. I told myself I wasn't going to get back in inadequate equipment, take a 25th place car and run 10th with it and still get called a no-driving son of a b-tch.

"I figured I would keep working out, work on sponsorship programs and if the right situation came along, I'd just go do it. This just shows right here that winning 300 or 400 races in your life, you don't forget how to drive a race car.

"They can talk all they want about this young stuff. I might be 41, but I feel 25."