Counting down the top 10 moments at Bristol

Posted on August 21, 2013 by

From Denny Hamlin vs. Joey Logano to Dale Earnhardt vs. Terry Labonte, watch, read and remember Thunder Valley’s best

There is just something about Bristol Motor Speedway — the tight confines, the coliseum setting, the lights blazing and camera flashes popping after dark. Few tracks ignite anger and aggravation more regularly than the World’s Fastest Half-Mile, where high speeds and close quarters can combine to create chaos.

The place just has an atmosphere about it, one that seems to heighten tension as easily as the fog rolls in from the Great Smoky Mountains. That’s especially true when darkness falls, and sparks — both real and metaphorical — fly during the facility’s night race, an annual fiesta of tempers and torn sheet metal that can test a competitor’s mettle as much as his machine.

On Saturday night, the curtain will be drawn back once again. Drivers will be introduced to clips from their favorite songs, engines will be fired and possibilities will swirl. And by the end of the evening, perhaps another item will be added to the ever-expanding list of indelible Bristol memories, those wins, losses, scuffles and skirmishes that have made the track what it is.

For the moment, though, the past provides plenty to work with. Entering this year’s edition of the Irwin Tools Night Race, here are the top 10 moments in Bristol Motor Speedway history.

10. Hamlin vs. Logano, 2013 spring race. By Bristol standards, it wasn’t the most combustible of encounters, but it certainly set the stage for a larger confrontation to come. Unhappy with the way Logano was racing him, Denny Hamlin resorted to the bumper and sent the No. 22 car spinning. “I meant to run into him, didn’t mean to spin him out,” Hamlin said. Afterward Joey Logano stormed over to the No. 11 and stuck his head inside the car before crewmen pulled him away. “He said he was coming for me,” Hamlin said, words that took on a more serious context one week later — when final-lap contact between the same two drivers resulted in a crash and a back injury that would sideline Hamlin for a month.

9. Keselowski vs. Busch, 2010 night race. Brad Keselowski certainly set the tone for the night when he grabbed the microphone to introduce himself, and then slammed someone else. “Kyle Busch is an ass!” he said, still stinging from what he thought was a deliberate takeout on Busch’s part in the Nationwide Series race one night earlier. Unsurprisingly, the crowd ate it up. But Busch got the last laugh, outrunning David Reutimann to win the race and finish off the first — and still only — tripleheader sweep in NASCAR history. Keselowski, meanwhile, finished 19th.

8. Edwards vs. Busch, 2008 night race. What started on the race track carried over to the cool-down lap, and the public-address system after the event. Carl Edwards bumped Busch out of the way to grab the lead with 30 laps remaining, and Busch bumped Edwards after the race. Edwards then spun Busch, did his trademark victory backflip, and after exiting their cars, the two drivers proceeded to trade verbal shots in interviews. Busch called Edwards “Mr. Ed,” Edwards called it payback for a Nationwide race at Richmond, and the crowd ate it up.

7. Gordon vs. Kenseth, 2006 spring race. What is it about Bristol that can turn even the most mild-mannered of drivers into raving lunatics? That certainly seemed the case in 2006. Jeff Gordon had just passed Matt Kenseth for third place on the final lap when contact from the No. 17 car sent his No. 24 spinning. They had also made contact earlier in the race, and afterward, two of the nicest guys in the sport went at it. Gordon exited his car on pit road, and with his helmet still on, went right at Kenseth and delivered a two-handed shove. Officials stepped in as the two drivers barked at one another. “I wasn’t happy about it,” Gordon said later, “and I showed him after the race.”

6. Harvick vs. Biffle, 2002 spring Nationwide Series race. The craziness at Bristol isn’t confined to Sprint Cup Series events. Two of NASCAR’s best went at one another following a Nationwide event in 2002, sparked when contact from Greg Biffle sent Kevin Harvick hard into the wall. Harvick got out of his car and went to Biffle’s pit stall. “I’ll be waiting when he comes in here,” he said, and he was, and the result was a nose-to-nose exchange that led to Harvick getting summoned to the series hauler “I didn’t do it on purpose. That’s just racing at Bristol,” Biffle said. “Biffle’s an idiot,” Harvick replied.

5. Stewart vs. Kenseth, 2012 night race. Once more, it’s Kenseth in the middle of the maelstrom, this time as he and Tony Stewart battle for the lead a year ago. The cars raced wheel-to-wheel, then touched, then turned sideways and began a long slide into the wall. Stewart exited his car on pit road, where he waited … and waited … and waited for Kenseth to come down before launching his helmet in a two-handed sling that bonked the No. 17 car square on the nose. The crowd went nuts, which Stewart recognized by whipping his fist into the air. “I’m going to run over him every chance I get for the rest of the year,” Stewart says. Get well soon, Tony. We miss you.

4. Gordon vs. Wallace, 1997 spring race. In the first of a number of memorable Bristol confrontations between the two champions, Wallace led 240 laps at his best track — but not the last one. Gordon patiently stalked Wallace, tried several times to get around, and then finally did by using the bump-and-run on the final lap, as Wallace drifted up the track slightly due to lapped traffic. It was an epic two-man battle that left Gordon pumping his fist in Victory Lane. “Got one of those love taps,” said Wallace, who’d have to wait until Richmond to exact a measure of revenge.

3. Everybody vs. Everybody, 2002 night race. Oh, goodness. Where to begin? If there was one night that summed up everything Bristol was about, it was this one. There must have been something in the water. How else to explain Mr. Cool, Jimmie Johnson, getting so mad at Robby Gordon that he unleashed a single-digit salute? Or Ward Burton getting so agitated at Dale Earnhardt Jr. that he threw his shoe heat shields at NASCAR’s most popular driver? Or Elliott Sadler getting so angry over an accident that he punched the side of an ambulance? This was theatre on a grand scale, topped by — what else — Gordon once again bumping Wallace out of the way to win.

2. Earnhardt vs. Labonte vs. Wallace, 1995 night race. In a precursor to a more famous showdown between the two yet to come, Dale Earnhardt hunted down Terry Labonte, narrowing a gap of over a second to just a few feet by the final lap. Earnhardt tried the bump-and-run, but tried it too late — Labonte’s car slid across the finish line sideways, and slammed head-on into the wall just past the flag stand. While Labonte drove his wrecked and smoking No. 5 to Victory Lane, Earnhardt exited the No. 3 to find an angry Rusty Wallace waiting on him. Earnhardt had dumped Wallace 30 laps into the event, and the two got into a heated exchange that included Wallace tossing a water bottle at the Intimidator. Just another night at Bristol.

1. Earnhardt vs. Labonte, 1999 night race. The scene: Earnhardt, in the lead and on old tires. Labonte, in fifth and with fresh rubber. The stage was set for Bristol’s most iconic moment, which unfolded after Labonte charged to the lead and squeezed low past Earnhardt at the white flag. Two corners later, chaos — Earnhardt used the bumper to turn the No. 5 car, which spun into traffic and collected several other vehicles in its wake. Earnhardt recorded a victory that was one of his most memorable, but also most unpopular. “Listen to the crowd,” a TV commentator says, “140,000 people booing him and giving him the bird. They weren’t happy with that one, and they weren’t the only ones.”

Labonte finished eighth, and Earnhardt was almost sheepish in Victory Lane — where he uttered the most famous words ever spoken at Bristol. “I didn’t mean to turn him around,” the Intimidator said. “I meant to rattle his cage."

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Posted on August 21, 2013 by

With Montoya’s stock car racing career possibly nearing an end, one can only wonder what could have been

When Juan Pablo Montoya left Formula One for NASCAR in late 2006, the move created shock waves on both sides of the Atlantic — in Europe, where it seemed unthinkable that an F1 driver would leave for stock cars, and in North America, where it raised global awareness of what was already the most competitive major form of auto racing in the world. It was an unprecedented event, a driver trading Monaco and Spa for Martinsville and Sonoma. Montoya arrived in the Sprint Cup Series with all the buzz of an international rock star.

Seven years later, it’s easy to forget what a watershed moment that was. Montoya’s long career with car owner Chip Ganassi — and potentially in NASCAR — is ending with a whimper, a simple non-renewed contract at the end of a lost season, and with us having witnessed only a fraction of what he might have been capable of in a stock car. Yes, he lived in Miami rather than North Carolina, and often spent his weekdays windsurfing rather than at the shop, but Montoya fully embraced the openness of the NASCAR garage area, and fully appreciated how hard Sprint Cup cars are to drive.

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Ultimately, that might be Montoya’s legacy — underscoring just how difficult it is to succeed at NASCAR’s premier level, even for someone who has won an Indianapolis 500 and seven career events in F1. This was a guy who had all the tools, who entered NASCAR with an established record of success, who won a major oval race, who was known for having an aggressive and physical style that would appear to translate perfectly to cars with fenders. And for a while, it did. In his third season, Montoya was a factor in the title race until a poor finish at Charlotte midway through the Chase for the Sprint Cup.

That was the high point. The seasons since have been slog, dismal campaigns that have eroded memories of just how electrifying Montoya can be behind the wheel. His decline has coincided with a makeover of his race team, which last year included a purge top executives at Earnhardt Ganassi Racing. Given that teammate Jamie McMurray has fared little better — save for his magical three-win season of 2010 — it seems clear some of the issues Montoya has fought are organizational in nature, making it difficult to lay all this solely at the foot of the driver.

“He should have won a bunch of races, so he’s certainly capable,” Martin Truex Jr., teammate to Montoya at EGR in 2009, said last week at Michigan. “It’s all about team chemistry and getting with the right people that all believe in each other, and all kind of work together well and push for that common goal. Maybe they just don’t have that right now. I don’t know. It’s hard to comment. It’s hard to speculate because I don’t know the details.”

At least on the outside, the changes seemed ineffective, even though Montoya and McMurray have both raved about an improved working atmosphere within the organization. Still, in a performance-based sport, results ultimately tell the tale. Montoya has showed some flashes this season — most notably at Richmond, where he nearly won — with crew chief Chris Heroy, a former engineer at Hendrick Motorsports who came aboard last year. And in truth, the No. 42 team is enjoying a nice stretch now, finishing 11th or better in three of its last four starts.

But it’s all too little, too late.

“They were sort of on decline,” Kyle Busch said. “… I think that had a little bit to do with bringing in a lot of new people. They pretty much cleaned house and brought in a lot of new people. They got rid of [Tony] Glover, they got rid of Steve Hmiel, and they brought in some new blood. Chris Heroy — I’m a huge fan. I love him. I think he’s a great crew chief and knows a lot and is very smart. I think he knows a lot about race cars. Last year I think was his learning year. Being a crew chief, he never was a crew chief in Nationwide, nothing. He jumped to a Cup crew chief, and I think there’s the same to be said of the driver. The Cup Series is so different that there’s a lot to learn there.”

Seven years is a long time, though. In the Sprint Cup ranks, only seven other drivers have been with their current teams as long as Montoya has been with EGR — Jimmie Johnson, Jeff Gordon, Denny Hamlin, Kevin Harvick, Jeff Burton, Carl Edwards and Greg Biffle. No shortage of success there, Ganassi and Montoya are close. Going back to their first stint together in open-wheel, and it’s unlikely Montoya would have jumped to NASCAR had Ganassi not been the one to reach out. As with any relationship, things can grow stagnant over time. Would Montoya have been better served leaving for another team that turned out more competitive cars? Perhaps. But given his loyalty to Ganassi, it’s hard to imagine he ever really considered it.

So now what? Montoya becomes the latest player in a free-agent drama that developed a curious subplot in recent days, when it became evident that Stewart-Haas Racing was targeting Kurt Busch for a potential fourth car in 2014. That seems an out of character move for SHR, which has always been conservative on the idea of expansion, waiting for sponsor and driver to align rather than risk overextending its reach. Then again, Busch is a special talent who has a good relationship with Stewart dating back to the Prelude to the Dream, and surely the hottest commodity on the market given the wonders he’s worked carrying single-car Furniture Row Racing to the brink of the Chase.

Then there’s Ryan Newman, in his last days with SHR — because, we thought, the team didn’t want to accommodate a fourth car with Kevin Harvick coming aboard — and still looking for a ride for 2014. AJ Allmendinger has surely enhanced his status with two Nationwide Series victories this season for Penske Racing, which also has a decision to make on Nationwide points leader Sam Hornish Jr. And is Ganassi really prepared to put developmental driver Kyle Larson in the No. 42 car, despite his relative lack of experience at the national level?

The only certainty seems that those drivers will all be racing in NASCAR next year in some capacity — something that can’t necessarily be said about Montoya, whose breadth of open-wheel experience surely opens other doors. The Associated Press has reported that Michael Andretti’s IndyCar team is courting Montoya heavily for next season, and the Colombian may have offered a clue to his destination in his media session at Michigan last week.

“My heart,” he said, “always has been in open wheel.”

It would be a sad thing indeed if these final weeks of the 2013 season are Montoya’s last in a stock car. Forget what he did off the track, where his role in raising NASCAR’s profile in Spanish-speaking markets cannot be overstated. The true wistfulness lies in that we so rarely were able to witness Montoya at his best — the brazen driver who took on Michael Schumacher in F1 and took on Stewart in the 2009 Chase, who competed with such tenacity and abandon, who could be mesmerizing and infuriating all at the same time. Whether that’s because the driver stagnated or the team regressed, it doesn’t really matter. We all lost as a result.

Maybe something unforeseen will happen yet this season to cap Montoya’s NASCAR adventure, or maybe some ride will materialize to extend it. Barring all that, what are we left with after nearly seven years? Two victories on road courses, two likely Brickyard triumphs given away by mistakes, one Chase berth, a few memorable tussles on the race track — and plenty of questions about what might have been.

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