Sometimes, teamwork isn't everything it appears

Who was that guy?

Certainly it wasn't Carl Edwards. It surely didn't appear to be, clothed in street-tough chic, looking ready to rumble in a menacing ensemble of camouflage shorts and black T-shirt, cap, and sunglasses. Carl Edwards smiles and does back flips and shows off his six-pack abs on magazine covers. He's a driven and competitive, but friendly and funny guy. He certainly doesn't pull a teammate away from a television interview and throw a fake punch so lifelike that the recipient flinches and two police officers walking by momentarily break stride.

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Or does he?

Evidently he does in moments like the one captured Sunday by a SPEED crew at Martinsville, when the cold war between Edwards and Roush Fenway Racing teammate Matt Kenseth flared up for all to see. It was like the 1986 Saturday Night Live skit where Phil Hartman portrayed a Ronald Reagan who was absent-minded and grandfatherly while posing for a photograph with a group of children, but behind closed doors harangued advisors on the intricacies of the Iran-Contra plan and even barked orders into the telephone in Chinese.

Things aren't always as they seem. Sunday's altercation at Martinsville was an uncharacteristically shocking display from a driver who is well-liked by both fans and reporters, who has a reputation as one of the good guys in the business, who immediately after the race ended talked of donating his firesuit to a charity auction. And it made public simmering differences between two top drivers on one of NASCAR's premier teams, a Roush organization that's won a pair of Cup championships. As coincidence would have it, Edwards -- who could clinch the Busch Series title Saturday in Memphis -- was the guest on NASCAR's weekly media conference call. After apologizing for his actions Sunday, he painted a picture of a Roush driver lineup that's anything but harmonious.

"As a team, we need to do a better job working together. I've won three races this year in the Nextel Cup Series. When I win, people call and congratulate and people are happy for me. It's just the wrong people. I've got Jimmie Johnson calling me every time I win to say good job. And my teammates aren't the ones doing that. And I'm just as guilty. I haven't been as happy for their successes as I could be. So for me personally, this is a bad, bad thing. Trust me," he said.

"Matt Kenseth and I have not spoken -- I don't think Matt's voluntarily said two sentences to me in the last six months, you know. And that's just how it is. We just don't talk a lot. We don't know one another well enough. And it's my opinion that that's what's precipitated this stuff is that lack of communication. So if it's, you know, unreconcilable, it won't be because I'm not trying. I'm ready to do whatever it takes to understand Matt, and be good teammates so we can enjoy the success that the people who are doing that are enjoying right now."

Geoff Smith, president of Roush Fenway Racing, said Edwards was referring only to the relationships between the team's drivers, and not questioning the camaraderie among the company's 500 employees. He added that team owner Jack Roush has spoken with both Kenseth and Edwards, and that the driver of the No. 99 car has received a sufficient verbal reprimand for his out-of-bounds actions at Martinsville.

"I recognized it right away as Carl being over the line by playing that game boys played in the eight grade called 'make you flinch,' " Smith said. "That's all that was, Carl going 'make you flinch,' which was really inappropriate to Matt and to the sponsors. He shouldn't have done it, and he's paying the price for it today."

There's a bit of on-track history here. The two made contact during a Busch race at Kansas, and Edwards' car suffered a cut tire as a result. After Edwards crashed out of the event, he mocked Kenseth by applauding as his teammate circled by on the racetrack. Sunday at Martinsville, Edwards dove into a corner on a restart only to find traffic stacked up by a slowing Reed Sorenson. He banged into Kenseth, who returned the favor later with a bump that cost the No. 99 car a few positions on the track. The contact angered Edwards, already miffed that an electrical issue had forced him to turn off his cockpit fan. Walking out of the racetrack, he saw Kenseth standing by the pit wall waiting to be interviewed, and vented.

"It was worst-case scenario," he said. "I had the alternator quit about Lap 185, so I shut my fans off. I have a massive headache. I'm frustrated. And I was walking out thinking about how frustrated I was, and I look up, and right there in front of me is Matt Kenseth standing there. And I don't remember what he said or even if he looked at me wrong. He might not have said anything. But just at that point I thought, well, I really would like to discuss this with him. And that's what it turned into." (Continued)