Bobby Hamilton Jr., left, gets direction from Brenda Sharp, center, and Jackie Adcock, right, as he helps deliver hot plates to customers at his Courthouse Cafe restaurant. Credit: AP

Hamilton Jr.'s meat-and-three wards off stress

Tennessee driver continues to live, work near hometown

SPRINGFIELD, Tenn. (AP) -- Bobby Hamilton Jr.'s face beams from photos on every wall.

His life-size cardboard cutout stands at the back, while the neon Tide clock of a Nextel Cup sponsor hangs over a soda fountain.

The black and white floor mimics Victory Lane, and the menu featured on the dry-erase board offers down-home Southern cooking.

	Hamilton Jr. cut his teeth at the Nashville fairgrounds, and he is one of the few Nextel Cup drivers who doesn't live in North Carolina. Credit: AP
	BOBBY HAMILTON JR. •   Driver Page •   2005 Stats •   Merchandise

This is the Courthouse Cafe, Hamilton's restaurant and his escape from the rigors of life on the NASCAR circuit.

"There's no pressure, just your employees," Hamilton said as he sat at the wooden lunch counter. "It's your hangout time."

In his first full Nextel Cup season, Hamilton has needed a sanctuary from the track.

He has the solid backing of PPI Motorsports Inc. boss Cal Wells III, plenty of advice from friend and 2002 champion Tony Stewart and a wealth of experience to tap in his own father, veteran driver Bobby Hamilton.

But that doesn't ease the relentless pressure to qualify high, run strong and finish well each week.

Hamilton hasn't done much of that this year, except for qualifying second at Atlanta and finishing 11th at Martinsville. Seven times he has qualified 26th or better, yet he's finished 35th or worse in seven races, including four straight 37th-place finishes, leaving him 37th in the points race.

"Run horrible again this week, 98 percent of the time you're ready to slit your wrists on the way home from the race track," Hamilton said.

But he finished fifth in the Nextel Open last weekend as part of NASCAR's All-Star event, which he hopes will set him up for a good showing in Sunday's Coca-Cola 600 on the same track in Charlotte.

Wells pointed out some of PPI Motorsports Inc.'s struggles have resulted from a personnel problem in the shop that has been fixed, as well as mechanical mistakes and being caught up in at least three wrecks.

ALSO PPI Motorsports announced that veteran road course driver Ron Fellows will climb behind the wheel of the No. 32 Chevrolet for the upcoming Nextel Cup Series race at Infineon Raceway in Sonoma, Calif., on June 26.  •   Complete story, click here

"If we eliminate those, we've got 400 more points ... and feel a lot better about where we're headed," Wells said.

It's not what Hamilton expected after five Busch Series victories, including four in 2003.

Stewart has counseled Hamilton that his run of bad luck will change. Hamilton keeps reminding himself that, even if he's 43rd, he's still among the best drivers in the world and that everyone's struggling as Hendrick and Roush dominate this season.

With the average age of Nextel Cup drivers skewing younger every year, the 27-year-old Hamilton knows his own window of opportunity is much shorter. That's why he's thinking about his financial future off the track.

"You've got to have a trampoline to fall back on when you get kicked off. Fall down, bounce up and get back up," he said. "You've got to have that."

Hamilton had been buying up buildings as investments on the town square in Springfield, about 25 miles north of Nashville, when he heard the owner of the Courthouse Cafe might be interested in selling.

"I looked at the incoming and outgoing, and I thought, 'That place is making money. We ought to keep it open and see how long it takes me to run it into the ground.' But it just took off," he said.

Credit: AP

Hamilton isn't just lending his celebrity to the restaurant in exchange for a cut of the profits.

He doubled the space by doing the work himself -- with the help of his wife, family and friends. He clears tables, washes dishes or just talks with customers.

"That's what's kept this place decent. You can come in and see a Nextel Cup driver washing dishes, cleaning floors," Hamilton said.

Running a restaurant is a complicated business that requires constant oversight. Hamilton quickly learned he needed employees he could trust while tracking his costs and haggling with suppliers for the best deal.

But the more time he spent in the restaurant -- where the menu features country fried steak, fried green tomatoes and even fried Oreo cookies -- the more comfortable he felt as a Nextel Cup driver when dealing with both sponsors and fans.

"When fans came up, even at the worst time in the world when you're just furious and running last, all of a sudden you put that face on and you do your deal. ... It's also helped with my Cup deal just adjusting to different situations. That's been the cool part," he said.

"You have to wear so many masks as Cup driver and wear so many masks as a business person," he added. "It makes me better for my job."

Wells' last driver, Ricky Craven, won a race after his snowmobile business burned down. Wells said Hamilton's restaurant hasn't been a distraction despite the ever-increasing demands of the Nextel Cup.

"What I like is that he realizes it and that he is working diligently, very committed to his craft, and he is very committed to growing as a Nextel Cup driver," Wells said.

Racing remains Hamilton's first love.

He even tried to help out the old Nashville track where he used to race by taking part in a series designed around his schedule.

That fizzled after he crashed in his first race April 24 and was fined $1,000 for a fight that involved his crew.

He owns a local racing team and toys with the idea of trying to own a NASCAR team someday. But his main focus is proving he can run well in Nextel Cup -- all the while planning for the future.

"I'm figuring when I'm 40 years old, they're going to want to put 15-year-olds in the Cup cars, so you've got to have other plans besides this," he said. "The money's great. You might as well try to invest in things you think are going to make you money at the end."