Road ringers good, bad or seemingly indifferent?

1. The road-course ringers -- Scott Pruett, Brian Simo, Boris Said, Ron Fellows, etc. -- are back for Sunday's event at Sonoma. Is it a good idea to put these guys in a car for a one-shot deal? And will one of them ever win?

David Caraviello: I love this. The season is so numbingly long, any variety is welcome. The road courses put on better shows than people give them credit for. And these ringers up the ante for the regulars, who don't want to lose to them.

Dave Rodman: If you look at the six cases for Sonoma -- but I think deleting Boris because it's his own team -- it fits, because none of the teams are going anywhere, anyway. So you might as well use the best available shoe.

Joe Menzer: If folks want to keep the ringers out of it, there is one simple solution: have your regular driver invest some time in getting better on the road courses. Until then, bring 'em on. I agree. They spice things up. Fact is, with only two road courses on the schedule, it's difficult to justify having your regular driver invest too much time in getting better on them -- especially when so much time needs to be spent elsewhere getting acclimated with the new car on different tracks that go in circles.

David Caraviello: Many of the Cup regulars once sort of went through the motions on road courses. The presence of the ringers forced these guys to elevate their games, and has made for better races in the process.

Dave Rodman: Will they win? Well, since Dan Gurney -- the ultimate ringer -- they have not had much luck. But they are certainly capable. It's just that these Cup regulars aren't tagged "the best racers on the planet" for no reason.

David Caraviello: Yeah Dave, we're seen a lot of improvement in attitude and ability on road courses over the years. Gurney's win was where, at Riverside in 1968? Been a long time since a ringer has won since.

Joe Menzer: It's funny, but I was just talking to Richard Petty about road racing the other day at Michigan. And dang if Dan Gurney's name wasn't about the first out of his mouth. He said those guys felt like they were racing for second when he came in -- but he only won once?

David Caraviello: My bad, that was just the last one. He won like five other times.

Dave Rodman: Ol' Dan won something like three out of four, I think. I don't think he gets enough credit -- along with A.J. and Mario -- as perhaps being the best American racer, ever.

Dan Gurney

Gurney is one of three drivers, along with Mario Andretti and Juan Montoya, to win a race in NASCAR, Indy Car and Formula One.

Career Results: NASCAR

Track	No.	W	T-5	T-10	Avg. Fin.
Atlanta	1	0	0	0	36.0
Daytona	6	0	3	4	10.8
Riverside	9	5	5	6	8.8

David Caraviello: The official record: Gurney won five out of six years between 1963-68. All of them at Riverside.

Joe Menzer: I knew either Caraviello or the King was losing it a little bit. Should have figured it was the former and not the latter.

Dave Rodman: But these days, the guys in stock cars who excel at road racing -- the Gordons, Stewart -- have such diverse backgrounds and they are so good, excelling on road courses is only one more check in their books not too far removed from everything else they excel at.

David Caraviello: Sorry, Joe, I'm not exactly up on my '60s racing. Anyway, you covered those events, didn't you, Joe?

Joe Menzer: From my crib, yeah. I was born with notepad and pen in hand. Seriously, I think you have me mixed up with the other distinguished (nice word for "old") gentleman on our panel today.

David Caraviello: I'm sure those Riverside races were mandatory viewing in the Menzer household. Anyway, the thing about the ringers today is, several of them are legitimate threats to win each time out. Guys like Fellows and Said usually show up with good stuff.

Dave Rodman: Kevin Harvick gets maybe the most credit in my book for upping his game on the road courses, but there have been some others. Not coincidentally, Robby Gordon mentioned Jeff Burton as another stocker who's made considerable strides -- and you can't leave out Jamie McMurray.

David Caraviello: It's amazing sometime to watch these road-course races unfold. Undoubtedly, there's always someone at the front now that leaves you thinking, wait, when did he become a good road-course racer? McMurray last year at Sonoma certainly fits the bill. We got used to the same guys -- Gordon, Stewart, Rudd, Wallace -- winning all the road races, it's nice to see some change every once in a while.

Dave Rodman: Harvick made note of the fact that having Robby as a teammate at RCR made all of them upgrade all their road-course stuff, so that's a pretty big deal. It has shown since Robby moved on.

Joe Menzer: I think this is maybe where Jeff Gordon makes a stand. Now that Junior has finally won again, it's Gordon's turn to break what is building up into a surprising winless streak. As for the others, they all get better after a while -- or they are replaced by ringers. Even Jimmy Spencer got better at it after a while when he was racing. Jim Hunter said that Spencer used to cut the corners so badly and go flying so high in the air "you could see San Francisco underneath his car."

Editor's Note: Mark Donohue was the last road-course "ace" to win a road-course race in the Cup Series. Donohue won the 1973 Winston Western 500 at Riverside International Raceway in team owner Roger Penske's No. 16 Matador. (Continued)