August 24, 2006
Everybody welcome back to school year Fall 2006. We're finally seniors everybody! How did we make it this far? Anyone remember? Anyways, I hope everyone starts off a great school year, I know I'm gonna try to hit the ground running but...sometimes that just makes you fall faster.
I want to jump right off to my article of discussion for the week. I've had several Jeff Gordon fans breathing DuPont flames down my neck this past week because of what transpired Saturday. For those of you who don't know, Dale Jr was racing in the NASCAR Busch Series race at Michigan, when Carl Edwards supposedly broke loose, Junior spun him because he had a run going, and ended up winning the race. People are mad at me because I felt that it was appropriate for Dale Jr to spin Carl Edwards, but it was NOT appropriate for Jeff Gordon to spin Matt Kenseth earlier this year at Chicagoland.
Let me affirm my position with you. I am happy that Dale Jr took the John Mansville/Menards Chevrolet to victory lane. I am NOT happy about the coincidences that transpired to put him there. The question on everyone's mind is, did Dale Earnhardt Jr intentionally wreck Carl Edwards? My belief is no, and I will support you three reasons why. Number 1: If you look at Dale Earnhardt Jr's career, he's tried to avoid contraversy his entire NASCAR career. Sometimes it just can't be helped, but consistentantly he has shown that he respects other drivers, and will often let the other guy by, or relax a bit from a tense situation, back off and let things calm down so that he doesn't cause a wreck. That's one reason I like him. Number 2: Dale Earnhardt Jr had an excellent car on race day. The Menards Chevrolet ran very well up top all day, and he had moved high up on the last restart to again use that high line to his advantage. Robby Gordon, who was driving the#88 Busch Series car FOR Dale Earnhardt Jr, was running 2nd during the last two restarts, and noticed that Carl tended to be rather loose, meaning the back end of his car wanted to spin up and hit the wall. So Carl's car maybe wasn't the best it could have been. Number 3: Robby Gordon. While I wasn't pleased with his near wrecking of Dale because Dale was trying to make a pass. But when it came down to the last lap, Robby and Dale Jr were both battling for the position, why would Dale intentionally wreck Carl Edwards, when the #88 car he owns would probably be caught in the wreck as well? Spock would say it was "not logical." I do not believe Dale meant to intentionally wreck anyone, chalk it up to hard racing, and that was that. He admitted feeling rather bad about it after the race, but the race was over, what can you do?
Now, lets talk about Jeff Gordon for a minute. At Chicagoland last summer, it came down to a few laps to go with Matt Kenseth leading and Jeff Gordon in second. Jeff either sped up and hit Kenseth, ending his chances of winning the race, or Kenseth's car went to junk in a hurry. I was not pleased with Jeff because in his post-race interview, he said that he didn't mean to hit Kenseth and all...yet he still let it linger that perhaps this way packback from Bristol. And in the days after the race, he kinda went out to the public and said he's gonna do what it takes to win. Does that mean that if he's close enough to spin someone out, he'd take that opportunity? He left questions unanswered, and avenues explored, and lets not forget he was already on probation...and that does not do good for one's credit.
In the end, all it comes down to is the car behind, hit the car in front. As Michael Waltrip says, "if you hit a guy in the rear, its your fault. It doesn't matter if you meant it, or if it was an accident, it's still your fault." Are both Jeff and Dale guilty of wrecking a race car? Yes. Intentionally??? Nobody can be sure. In any case, I'm not losing any sleep at night, and I'm still a Dale Jr fan.
