All of it, p.20
All of It, page 20
By the time Todd got seated and secured into the No. 60 car, we had fallen four laps down. There was still over half the race to make up for the lost laps. Todd was able to make up for all the laps that we had fallen behind and got the No. 60 car back to the lead lap and in contention for the win towards the end of the race. On the final pit stop, Jim Long called for a two-tire pit stop instead of four fresh tires. The racecar was fast all day on four brand-new race tires, and I believe if the team had changed all four tires instead of just two, maybe the No. 60 would have been No. 1 at the end of 400 laps. Instead, Todd drove a great race and finished a solid thirteenth.
I know we had a great racecar setup, and Todd is one heck of a wheelman, but our car shouldn’t have been that much better than everyone else to make up four laps. I can’t prove that we had some help from Goodyear that day with some better, faster tires, but we did.
It would have been a great recipe for a Hollywood movie. A comeback win after a spectacular crash. But it wasn’t meant to be with that ending. However, getting back behind the wheel after the past two-and-a-half months was a great journey in itself. I never once considered hanging up the racing helmet during my time away. I only wanted to be back behind the wheel more.
The rest of the season was a challenge. There were some top-15 finishes and laps led at the New Hampshire race, but the speed wasn’t there like at the end of 1999. The No. 60 team started to miss races. Before I knew it, Joe Bessey called me up after the second Richmond race in September and told me my driving services were no longer needed. He was blaming me for the team’s poor performance because of the crash that I had in the Truck Series race at Daytona. He told me he would be taking over the driving duties for the rest of the season. I wished him the best of luck.
There weren’t many opportunities at the end of the year, but I did get to race two more times, once for Chip MacPherson at Homestead-Miami and once for Andy Petree at Atlanta to end the season. It seemed like that was going to be the end of my professional racing days. But it couldn’t be. I still wanted to be out there, yet options were sparse. I was open to racing in any of the national touring series, but I couldn’t line up a deal with a team.
For the first time since 1980, I would not be a part of speedweeks as a driver. However, I picked up a gig working color commentary with ESPN for their coverage of the four-race IROC season. I got to work alongside play-by-play announcer Bob Jenkins for the races, and the first event was held on February 16 at Daytona International Speedway, the Friday before the 2001 Daytona 500. Working on live television was a lot of fun, and I was looking forward to the next three races across 2001. Additionally, Barry was getting to drive in some Truck Series races, including the Daytona opener, so I got to help him and his team throughout the week.
Of course, the 2001 Daytona 500 is a day that will live on as one of the darkest days in our sport. The passing of Dale Earnhardt was tough for the sport and his fans. I was there at the track that day as a spectator. When the services were announced for The Intimidator, I, along with thousands of friends and fans, wanted to pay our respects to the man who meant so much to his family and the sport. Brett, Todd, and Dr. Jerry Punch joined us for the services in Kannapolis.
Dale and I were close friends. When he was killed, I really didn’t want to go to the funeral. I just wanted to mourn, hurt and be alone. But I got a call from Geoff and he said to me, “Hey Doc, you going down to the service?” I said I wasn’t going to go.
He said, “You need to go.” This is Geoff, now. This is his big, bitter rival. Geoff said, “We’ve got a limo, why don’t you come with us?” So I did. My wife and I went with Geoff. To this day, I don’t think that I’ve told anybody that, that it was Geoff Bodine that called me.
Dr. Jerry Punch
Finally, in June, an opportunity to race in the NASCAR Busch Series (former Grand National and current Xfinity Series) came with Cicci-Welliver Racing. Their previous deal with the original driver didn’t work out, and they wanted me to race the rest of the 2001 season. Then, a really cool opportunity came up in August to race for a pretty special person.
In 2001, Geoff drove a car for me at Bristol and Homestead. To me, that was the coolest thing to have him driving for me. Those were the only races he ran in 2001. I keep thinking, if I didn’t do that in 2001, would that have been the end? Would he have fallen off the map?
Brett Bodine
Brett gave me the shot to race the No. 09, a tribute to my dear friend Bryan Osgood from my modified racing days. The two races Brett let me drive for his team certainly kept the spark going, and another team owner wanted to put me in his car for the 2002 Daytona 500 and select races after.
Another Shot
at Daytona
A friend of mine, Phil Housman, and I worked out a sponsorship deal for the Miccosukee Indian Tribe of Southern Florida to sponsor several NASCAR Winston Cup Series races. We took the sponsorship to James Finch, who fielded cars in the Cup Series and Busch Series throughout the 1990s. James always had fast cars, and we felt like we could race well with his team and equipment.
During the Daytona speedweeks, the bright-red No. 09 Miccosukee Ford had speed throughout the week. Our team even had the fastest lap in one of the practice sessions. When it came time for single-car qualifying on pole day, the No. 09 was the twenty-ninth fastest. We were going to have to race our way into the Daytona 500 through the 125-mile qualifying races.
In the qualifying race, the No. 09 handled great, and I could draft well. Early on in the race, while racing underneath Sterling Marlin between Turn 4 and the start/finish line, Sterling crowded me down below the yellow line onto the apron of the racetrack, where drivers are penalized if they make a pass below the line. NASCAR officials said I tried to advance my position by going below the yellow line, and I would have to make a pass-through penalty on pit road to make up for it. If you were forced below the yellow line by another car, you’re not supposed to be penalized, but NASCAR penalized me anyway.
A crash on the track, which brought out a caution flag, allowed me to catch back up to the field. By finishing twenty-third, we made the starting field for the Daytona 500, which gave us a thirty-fifth-starting position. I was excited and relieved to race in NASCAR’s biggest race for the first time in three years.
The Daytona 500, as usual, was a very eventful race. The handling of the racecar wasn’t very good. During every pitstop, we were making adjustments to the chassis, trying to get the handling the way I needed it to be. Because we weren’t successful with our adjustments, instead of running in the middle of the pack and possibly crashing, I chose to run at the back of the lead pack. James Finch was so disappointed that I was running at the back of the pack that he left the pit box and exited the track towards the end of the race.
Throughout the second half of the race, crashes started taking out competitive racecars and drivers. Then, crash, “The Big One,” took out eighteen cars with fifty laps to go. Because we were running towards the back of the field, I was able to avoid crashing or getting any damage to the car. On the final pit stop, before coming down pit road, Marc Reno, my crew chief, radioed me and asked what changes I wanted the crew to make.
“I don’t know; I’m out of ideas,” I radioed back. “Just do something!”
When the car came to a stop in the pit box, Marc told the right-rear tire changer when he ran behind the car to take his air wrench and hit the braces that hold the rear spoiler at a certain required angle to bend them, which would decrease the spoiler’s angle. With a racecar, if you can’t get it to drive and handle the way you need it by adjusting the mechanical adjustments, that usually means that the car has an aerodynamic balance problem. Reducing the rear spoiler angle during the pit stop fixed the aerodynamic problem we had with the car and made it drive and handle absolutely the way I needed it to.
When we got back to racing from the eighteenth position, I could pass cars on the inside, on the outside, and even through the middle. I was saying to myself, “Just get out of my way! I’m going to the front.” With ten laps to go, I had caught the lead pack of cars. Jeff Gordon led Sterling Marlin, Ward Burton, Elliott Sadler, and myself. The five of us broke away ahead of the rest of the field.
Robby Gordon’s spinning caused a caution and a quick yellow flag period. The field would bunch up for a restart with six laps to go. In a single-file line, Jeff Gordon led us back to the green flag. As I was going past the start/finish line, behind me was a big crash involving six cars, which brought out the caution flag again. At the time, Sterling Marlin tried to make a pass on the inside of Jeff Gordon. Sterling’s right front bumper hooked Jeff’s left rear quarter panel and sent Jeff spinning towards the inside of the track.
The leader of the race was taken out of contention while racing back to the start/finish line to the caution flag. Sterling, while leading, drove his silver No. 40 Dodge along the inside line of the racetrack to block any attempts of being passed on the inside. I was drafting behind Sterling, and on the outside of me, Ward Burton and his black-and-yellow No. 22 Dodge had Elliott Sadler’s No. 21 red-and-white Ford pushing him.
It was a drag race between the four cars down the backstretch. Sterling’s car was smoking a little bit as we neared the finish line. This was possibly the last lap of racing at full speed. At that time, NASCAR didn’t have an overtime rule, so the race would end no matter if it was a green-flag or yellow-flag condition after its scheduled distance.
At the line, Sterling edged Ward for the lead, and I edged Elliott for third. In an effort to try and give the race a chance to finish under the green flag, NASCAR displayed the red flag, which stops all action on the track. During a red flag period, drivers are instructed to stop behind where the pace car brings the field to a halt.
In this case, NASCAR stopped the cars on the backstretch to allow the track safety crews to clean up the debris on the frontstretch and to be able to restart the race with three laps to go. Sterling was first, Ward was second, I was third, and Elliott was fourth.
While our cars were parked on the backstretch, I saw Sterling climb out of his car and try to pull on his right-front fender, where he made contact with Jeff Gordon’s car, away from his tire. While the race is under the red flag, NASCAR’s rule is no work can be done on the car, on pit road, and absolutely on the racetrack by the driver. Sterling’s violation forced NASCAR to penalize him, and he was forced to restart the race at the back of the field, which took him out of contention for the win. I radioed my crew and told them that I had run over something during the melee and might have a flat tire, but I wasn’t going to get out of my car to look and see what might be wrong like Sterling did.
After about ten minutes, the yellow flag was displayed again, and we were back to pacing the field at sixty-five miles per hour. Ward was now the race leader, and I was second. I thought my car was going to be fast enough on the restart to get around Ward for the lead.
Green flag. Three laps to go. I started picking up speed and shifting through the gears. I was wide open on the throttle. I was going to give Ward a bump, but something was wrong. I couldn’t get to Ward’s rear bumper to give him a bump to move him out of my way. I found myself battling with Elliott for second, but he overtook me, and he finished second while I finished third.
I was disappointed and confused as to why my car wasn’t as fast the last three laps as it was before the restart. After stopping on pit road and getting out of the car, the crew approached me, and I told them that I didn’t know why the car didn’t have the speed during those last three laps.
They said to me, “Come here, and we’ll show you.”
Walking to the front of the car, it was quite obvious that what I ran over during the last caution had smashed the left-front grille and fender, which is why the car slowed down during those last three laps. And after seeing that, I realized that if there had been more laps in the race, I would have been passed by other cars and not finished third.
Post-race, Matt Snyder of NBC interviewed me on pit road, and I thanked James for the opportunity with a great car and the Miccosukee Indian tribe for their support of the team. It was a great start to the season and gave our small team some momentum. Our next planned race was Talladega in a couple of months. The finish was a great shot in the arm and only fueled my craving to get back to Victory Lane.
Before our next race at Talladega on Sunday, April 21, unfortunately, my fiance Angela passed away on April 14, and her services and burial were on April 18, which is my birthday. During that week, I didn’t eat or sleep much and didn’t think at all about racing. But I had to travel to Talladega on Thursday to be ready to practice, qualify, and race on Sunday. It was very hard being there, but I know Angela would have wanted me to be there to race.
Starting twenty-third in the race, and because I didn’t take care of myself physically that week, during the race, I started to get weak and sick. We happened to be pitted next to Tony Stewart’s pit, and Greg Zipadelli, Tony’s crew chief, on our first pit stop, saw my crew giving me water, trying to help me feel better. Zippy asked my crew what was wrong with me, and they explained the situation to him. He went back to his pit box and brought to my crew a bottle of Rehydralyte, a drink full of electrolytes, and told them on the next pit stop to hand it to me to drink.
The next pit stop was under caution, which gave me time to drink it. And before the race restarted, I was already starting to feel better. After a few laps under green, I was feeling normal and able to race at full speed, and we had a twelfth-place finish. Thanks, Zippy! For the rest of the season, my brothers and I drank Rehydralyte before every race. Naturally, the twelfth-place finish didn’t take the pain away from Angela’s death.
Our next race was the Pepsi 400 at Daytona in July. We continued to show superspeedway strength with a second-place starting position. We managed to stay out of wrecks, have good pit stops, and finished tenth.
The Brickyard 400 at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway was our next race. I started twenty-fourth, and on lap fifty-one, I blew a right-front tire entering Turn 1 at 190-plus mph, crashed into the outside retaining wall, slid across the track, and hit the inside retaining wall. After being released from the infield care center, I mentioned to a track official that the soft wall didn’t feel very soft to me. It hurt. Then, he told me that I didn’t hit the soft wall; I went far enough around the Turn-1 corner that I missed the soft wall by three feet. I hit the solid, concrete wall.
The next race was at Richmond in September, and I qualified the racecar in forty-first. The race was short-lived for our team, as we suffered from engine problems and finished thirty-eighth out of the race. Unfortunately, at the next race on our schedule at Talladega, the No. 09 didn’t get a chance to turn a lap in qualifying. Rain washed out the qualifying session, and NASCAR’s rule is to line up the field based on the owner’s points. Our team was so low in owner’s points because of our part-time schedule that we missed the race by default. It was a weird feeling to miss that race because our superspeedway cars were fast, and I had run up front at both Daytona races and the spring Talladega race.
I raced Martinsville in a one-race deal for Bill Davis Racing in his No. 23 car, substituting for his usual driver, Kenny Wallace. We ran really well for a while in the race. I fell one lap down at one point, drove past the leaders to get back on the lead lap, and led a few laps, but ultimately finished the race in thirty-ninth, three laps down.
The next race on the schedule was Atlanta, and I was scheduled to be back in the No. 09 racecar. Qualifying was rained out, just like at Talladega, and our team missed the race. Our last race together was going to be at the last race of the season at Homestead-Miami Speedway. Along with racing the Cup car on Sunday, James Finch and I agreed to run the Busch Series race (today’s NASCAR Xfinity Series) on Saturday. I went to the shop in Panama City, Florida, to look at the Busch car and to get the steering wheel, seat, and pedals all to my needs. Crew chief Marc Reno informed me that the front cross member, which connects the two front frame rails together underneath the engine, needed to be raised up so it wouldn’t drag on the racetrack. Mark told me the modifications that the Busch car and Cup car needed would be done and that the cars would be ready to roll when unloaded at the track in Homestead.
Three days before leaving for the Homestead race weekend, I received a phone call from Marc telling me that James wanted the sponsorship money before he would take the cars to Homestead. Throughout the year, because a friend of mine, Phil Housman, and I put the Miccosukee Indian Tribe sponsorship together, and they would send me the sponsorship money, I would always take a check to the racetrack to James for the race we were at.
So when Marc told me he wanted the money before going to the racetrack, a red flag went up. I had a feeling that James and Marc were trying to pull a fast one on me and the Miccosukee tribe. I told Marc on the phone the only way that I would give James the sponsorship money would be the same way we had done it all year, that I would bring a check to the racetrack and not before. After a day went by, Marc called me back and said that would be okay.
When I showed up at the racetrack, I gave Marc the sponsorship check and proceeded to go to the Busch Series garage to see the crew and car. When I got there, the car was in the garage with one crew member, who happened to be the transport driver.
“Where’s Marc and the rest of the crew?” I asked him.
“I thought Marc was in the grandstands to be the spotter,” he said, also telling me he didn’t know where anyone else was.
“Where’s the setup sheet for the car?” I asked.
He answered, “I don’t know.”
Another red flag went up. Phil Housman, the transport driver, and I began prepping the car for our first practice. We put the practice tires on the car, checked the air pressure in the tires, warmed the engine up, put the radio in the car, and then I went and put my race uniform on, got my helmet and gloves, and climbed in and strapped into the No. 51 Miccosukee-sponsored Chevrolet.
