#57 - The Monster Is Coming!
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06/26/2018 Matt McLaughlin |
(Editor’s Note) In 1997
- 1998, Matt McLaughlin penned a special Anthology of historical pieces in
honor of the 50th Anniversary of NASCAR entitled "50 Years of NASCAR
Racing." Matt has entrusted the entire collection, minus one or two that
were misfiled back then and cannot be salvaged, to my tender, loving care.
As NASCAR turns 70, the
Anthology itself will celebrate a 20th anniversary through 2018, and will run
again here on Race Fans Forever. As before, there is no record of which pieces
came first, so it will appear in the sequence presented earlier. Please, sit
back and enjoy as you take a journey back through the pages of history and
perhaps relive a memory or two.
As always, many thanks
to Matt, and God bless you my friend. ~PattyKay
In a sport where there are very few absolutes, few
fans will argue that Dover's notorious Monster Mile is the toughest track on
the circuit. The Monster will gobble up cars, wear out drivers, and dash their
dreams in the blink of an eye, without so much as a
guilty belch. Not all drivers enjoy their forays to Dover Downs; some outright
despise the place, and Dale Earnhardt once snidely referred to running on the
concrete surface of the track as "Racing on the sidewalks."(With all
due apologies to Mr. Earnhardt, having driven a Winston Cup car at Dover in a
driving school, I have to disagree with his assessment. If racing on the
sidewalks was that much fun I'd have never quit skateboarding, though I'll
agree the track sure does grab your attention.)
Dover Downs held their first race in NASCAR's top
division on July 6th, 1969. The facility had originally been built as a horse
racing track, and that horse track still exists in the infield. More recently,
a slot machine casino has been added to the track for those whose taste in
gambling runs a bit more sedate than trying to pass Dale Earnhardt going into
turn one. Through the first few years of its existence, Dover seemed to be holding
a benefit race for Richard Petty and Bobby Allison and both drivers share a
record seven wins at the track. In a quirk of statistics, Richard Petty never
won a Winston Cup title since the track opened without finishing second or
better in at least one Dover race, and in fact he has won at the track in four
of five of his championship years in the Winston Cup era.
The Monster gave the front runners a vivid lesson in
its appetite for fast cars in May of 1976. Rookie Ricky Rudd lost control on
the high banks and spun. The accident wound up collecting Benny Parsons, David
Pearson, Bobby Allison and Buddy Baker. Parsons was forced to pit five times
under yellow to have repairs made to his Chevy, and the results were nothing to
write home about. The car was all torn up. Still Benny was able to patiently
work his way to the front, while other front runners like Darrell Waltrip
suffered mechanical failures, and the Petty crew just couldn't get their car up
to speed. In an incident that shows how much NASCAR has changed, at one point
Cale Yarborough was held at the end of pit road and lost a lap. His enraged
crew chief Herb Nab stormed down to "discuss things" with the NASCAR
official involved and wound up popping him one in the mouth. After the race, NASCAR
decided Herb hadn't hit him hard enough to deserve a fine. Nowadays such an
action would earn an individual a one way ticket on the space shuttle. Back out
on the track, Benny Parsons drove his rambling wreck back into the lead and
held on to beat David Pearson, who had also been involved in the melee, by over
25 seconds. After the race, an exhausted Parsons had to be helped from his car.
The spring race at Dover in 1981 brought two first
time winners to victory lane, amidst a hail of protests. Jody Ridley won his
first (and only) Winston Cup race that day, but perhaps more importantly, it
remains the only win to date for Junie Donlavey as a car owner, in a career
that started in 1950 and has included close to 750 starts to date. The win was
marred by a flap over scoring, with Bobby Allison and his car owner Harry
Ranier loudly protesting that they had actually been a half lap ahead of
Ridley, not behind. NASCAR sheepishly admitted there had been confusion in the
scoring charts that day, but it had seemed irrelevant at the time as Neil
Bonnett was two laps up on the field. Bonnett lost an engine however and
suddenly the scoring confusion concerned the leaders. After reviewing the
situation, NASCAR decided to the best of their knowledge Ridley had won. As
tight as the point battle was between Cale Yarborough and Bobby Allison that
year, the mix up at Dover remained a source of controversy throughout the rest
of the season.
While not quite as impressive as his comeback at
Talladega in '85, Bill Elliott did manage a "minor miracle" at Dover
in the spring of 1988. Elliott seemed to have the set up on his car down that
day, and was racing up front through much of the early parts of the event along
with his main competition in the points chase that year, and a surprisingly
strong Morgan Shepherd, substitute driving for Harry Gant who had been injured
at that year's World 600. Disaster struck the nine team on lap 224 in the form
of a flat tire and when Elliott returned to the track, he was down almost two
laps. Like a runaway train, Elliott started marching through the field, looking
like the Awesome Bill of old, and on lap 462, he took the lead from Shepherd
and cruised on to a 21-second victory. In retrospect, that effort was even more
important than a mere race win. Had Elliott indeed finished two laps off the
pace that he would have lost the 1988 Winston Cup championship to Rusty
Wallace.
It's hard to consider Dale Earnhardt an underdog at
any track he ran at in the late eighties, but Dover had not been good to Dale.
He didn't score his first victory there until 1989, a decade into his career
that already included three championships. Though he dominated the event,
leading 456 of 500 laps the win was not without drama. Kenny Schrader was in
second as the race headed for the crossed flags signifying the half way point.
There was a 10,000 dollar bonus for leading at halfway, and Kenny decided he'd
like to have that. In a move he later claimed he had learned watching
Earnhardt, Schrader put a bumper to the black three car and shoved him out of
the way. Earnhardt was clearly annoyed by the move and said after the race,
"I've got a memory like an elephant. Somewhere down the road I just might
slip and get into him. (Schrader)" Earnhardt was able to retake the lead
on the next lap, and in the end, held off a determined charge from Mark Martin
who was running hells bells to catch him, hanging on for a .51-second gap at
the checkers and a $59,350 pay day, which buys a lot of peanuts.
The tables were turned at the Dover race in the spring
of '91. That day Kenny Schrader decided to try a new strategy. He had a
reputation for getting up front early, getting into the wall and getting to go
home early. Instead, that day he played a conservative strategy and let the
Monster deal with the hard chargers. Earnhardt was among those who suffered the
Beast's wrath. After dominating the first half of the race, he suffered a flat
tire that forced an unscheduled pit stop. When Dale returned to the track the
leader, Harry Gant, was right behind him and about to put him a lap down. Gant
clearly wanted to get Earnhardt a lap down to take him out of contention for
the win, and Earnhardt just as clearly didn't want to go a lap down. The two
raced side by side for seven laps, in a hoot and holler duel that had more
close calls than a drunken virgin at a semester's worth of frat parties.
Finally, a caution flag kept Dale from going down a lap and Dale methodically
worked his way back to the front, reassuming the lead on lap 406. Running in
second place was one Kenny Schrader, a driver Dale had said he had some
unfinished business with back in '89. On lap 423 Schrader dove low and got
around Dale, then drove his heart out for the rest of the race to try to keep
Dale from paying back that favor. Kenny went on to beat Earnhardt by about 1.2
seconds, and it remains to date his last Winston Cup victory.
Dover was a bit kinder to Dale in the spring race of
1993, though the track lived up to its monstrous reputation that day, with the
racing interrupted 14 times for a total of 78 laps. 12 drivers who started the
day with high hopes went home with trashed race cars instead. Rookie Jeff
Gordon was involved in an early incident and returned to the fray in a battered
race car, cruising around the apron of the track for points. Unfortunately, he
managed to tangle with Darrell Waltrip on lap 418 of the race, and despite the
mutual admiration both drivers claim to have for one another these days, some
harsh words were exchanged after the race between DW and Wonder Boy. Geoff Bodine,
who was making one of his first starts as car owner of the 7 team he had
purchased after Alan Kulwicki's tragic demise, was
also given a lesson in the economics of racing, as in how much it costs to
replace a totaled race car. Mark Martin and Rusty Wallace were Dale Earnhardt's
main competition for the title, and while Dale had taken command of the race in
the later stages, both Mark and Rusty were running well. Wallace was still
recovering from the broken wrist he had suffered a little over a month before,
after a last lap tangle with Earnhardt at Talladega, but had worked his way to
second, while Martin was third. Mark tried to go under Rusty to take that
position and his car got bad loose. Hard contact was made and Rusty slammed the
wall, while Mark's car suffered only minor damage. The points Rusty lost that
day, winding up in 21st rather than second, were more than the margin he lost
that year's title chase to eventual Dover race winner Dale Earnhardt that day.
While I can't say who'll win this weekend's race at
Dover, I can say this much. During the event, there will be crew chiefs tearing
their hair out trying to find the set up. In the course of 400 laps, more than
one strong race car will wind up being shoveled into the back of the
transporter for a final ride to the dump. And whatever driver claims the trophy
and big check is going to have worked hard to wrestle a win away from the
Monster.
*Matt can no longer
field comments or email at Race Fans Forever. If you have comments or
questions, please leave them below and I’ll do my best to supply answers.
~PattyKay Lilley, Senior Editor.