NASCAR OFF SEASON WITHDRAWAL THERAPY THREAD (post news updates here)

ME

[WestCoastGal]

Todays trip down memory lane.......

Dale Earnhardt Dale Earnhardt - What else do you need to say? The man who grew up to be the Intimidator, the One Tough Customer, learned by watching his father make a living work on race cars and drive race cars on tracks all over the south. During "hot laps" Dale would sit in the passenger side of his father, Ralph's car holding on to the rollbars while Ralph warmed the car up. When it was time to pick up speed, Ralph would pull in the pits and Dale would climb out. Dale started his career at Concord Speedway & Metrolina Speedway. He began in a 55 Ford and then a Falcon similar to the model pictured below.

You can attribute his mastery of car control and his desire to win to his roots on Carolina dirt tracks.

A photo from a Concord Speedway program shows Ralph, Dale, & Randy with Ralph's 55 Chevrolet.

[SouthTexas]

Mine are small, WAY too small to cause that many pitstops!!!

[ChefKeith]

Hey there Pretty Lady

[WestCoastGal]

Hey there, thank you for the flowers. ;)

---

Here's a little Winston Cup history lesson for you all.....

In the Beginning...

By Mike Mulhern

JOURNAL REPORTER

Once upon a time cigarettes were a prime staple of television advertising.

John Wayne smoking Camels....

"Winston tastes good like a (click, click) cigarette should." And Marlboro’s Theme from the Magnificent Seven.

But Congress forced the tobacco companies out of the TV marketplace, sending them and their huge advertising funds down another road.

So at midnight Jan. 1, 1971, the last tobacco TV commercial had been shown. And with that, a new sports world was born, and NASCAR racing was, coincidentally, saved from pending doom.

It is all the stuff of dusty legend now: 1969 was stock-car racing’s high point. But when Ford and Chrysler abruptly withdrew their massive sponsorships at the end of

1970, the sport almost collapsed. With the De-troit spigot turned off, NASCAR’s star teams all closed their doors, until only Petty Enterprises was left.

Today, that might be nearly impossible to understand, or even believe, that the sport had but one major team left running. (Richard Petty won 21 races in ’71 and finished second or third in 15 others.)

Not surprising, perhaps, tracks went bankrupt. Yes, bankrupt, with Chapter 11 judges in charge of finances.

If you want to know why NASCAR politics sometimes seems skewed against Ford and Chrysler, well, Jimmy Spencer says he has a long memory, but Bill France Jr.’s is longer. He has never forgotten those dark days, and that when it was the darkest, General Motors, albeit under the table, jumped in to bail out NASCAR teams with engine parts and technical support.

And then came the 1973 Arab oil embargo and the messy economic slump that it created.

It was into this state of affairs that R. J. Reynolds leaped, urged on by Junior Johnson. The Wilkes County car builder had approached RJR in 1971 about sponsoring his race team, but as the negotiations continued, Johnson told Reynolds executives that they should consider sponsoring the entire series.

It was, as it turned, a marriage made in marketing heaven. RJR’s Winston brand wound up kingpin of the what would become the country’s second most popular sport, although it would take more than 20 years to become such a success.

And, as it turned out, it was a bargain-basement deal — while NASCAR may look like a million, or billion, bucks today, it took nearly 10 years for the sport to really get back on its feet, and another 10 years to make the giant leap into what we see it as today.


More.......

http://www.print2webcorp.com/news/winston/winstoncup/20031009/p02.asp

[ChefKeith]

[SouthTexas]

Is it race time yet?

I've been flipping channels and there is NOTHING.

[WestCoastGal]

Craftsman Truck Series Banquet on this evening on Speed Channel.

8pm ET

From Miami Beach Florida.

[tubebender]

It's to bad Johnny Benson got a late start in the Truck Series. I think he finished in the top 10 in every race he was in...

[WestCoastGal]

I think Steve Park finished 9th also.

Benson did really well in the races I saw.

[steveegg]

And Brian France is pissing it all away.

---

Nice little humor-break blurb from The Pits -

Jamie McMurray Completes Lifelong Dream of Winning 11th Place

Children everywhere grow up with their own dreams—to be a cowboy, an astronaut, to win the World Series. Only a select few pursue those dreams into adulthood, and fewer still come close to succeeding. However, there are some, however infrequent, who make their dreams reality—those same dreams they acted out with their Hot Wheels on the living room floor.


Jamie McMurray lived out his dream this year. He finished 11th..... (continued over on The Pits)

[tubebender]

I heard today that my young friend Ryan Zeck got a try out with Jack Roush along with a few other drivers this month at North Wilksboro. STORY HERE There is a photo of Ryan in the series of pics on the site...

[steveegg]

So, did he survive the first gong?

[tubebender]

That's what I heard but I am not familiar with the program. What do you know about it?

[steveegg]

Took some digging, but with almost no fanfare, Roush Racing announced that Todd Kleuver won the Gong Show.

[steveegg]

One more thing; Ricky Craven (late of the Tide Slide ride) has the other Roush truck ride.

[GRRRRR]

Ok, I'm a freeeekin' addict OK?

I went to a new video game store the other day, last Tuesday I was on vacation.

They had EA Sports NASCAR 2004 for only $4.99....the man said it was "last season's" so it was on the SALE Rack.

I loaded it and have been racing all week...my hands are sore from driving...Daytona, Tally, Richmond, Bristol, Charlotte have all gone under my thumb...Dover etc. are all coming up this winter...

I'm really OK, good thing I gave away my steering wheel joystick setup...or else I'd need to get my helmet etc back.

Now, back to the game, if I can get just a few more laps in and figure out my aeropush in turn two...just can't get on the gas fast enough...

Grimey Pits
Nokia-Kia Racing Team

[WestCoastGal]

That was really funny. lol

Are they really going to charge for The Pits next year?

Did you see their poll about whether anyone would pay?

Why does Rousch call it the Gong show?

[WestCoastGal]

How lucky to have the chance to drive for Rousch.

He must have been so excited!!

[steveegg]

That poll just showed up. Well, when something becomes too popular on the Web, the costs of keeping it up go up exponentially (kind of hard to keep something like that or FR running on a home connection or two).

Roush doesn't call it the Gong Show; everyone else does.

[steveegg]

The new one for the PC will be out in February (EA's taking over Papy's release schedule as well).