Ohio Girl

Lordy boys. Y’all sure do get mad, huh? Yesterday’s race at Loudon was NOT boring. The first race of the championship season included some good, close racing, as well as some real, bad behavior.

The first caution came in Lap 3 when Scott Riggs got loose and sent Championship Chaser Kurt Busch into the wall. Once in the garage, Busch climbed from his car and flanked by a posse of NASCAR officials and reporters, stomped down pit row and climbed into the #10’s pit box. It looked as though things might get ugly for a moment, but Busch accepted the explanation and apology of the crew chief and eventually got back out on in track to make up some spots.

Next Kasey Kahne got turned for a hard crash by the junior Busch. Kahne pulled his wrecked car to the bottom of the track and waited for the 5 to come by. He then darted out in front of him hitting his left front under caution. He later justified his actions to reporters with something like, ‘you mess with me, I mess with you.’ He was clearly angry, but Kahne, who looks like he is barely twelve, is hard to take seriously as the heavy.

It took a veteran to really escalate things to full blown crazy. Following a wreck involving Spencer, McMurray, Nemechek and some others, Michael Waltrip turned around Robby Gordon under caution. Robby wrecked hard and snapped. He first attempted to ram Waltrip on the track, but missed him, almost collecting Chaser Stewart instead. Once he parked his car, he proceeded to march out onto the track, in front of traffic, throwing his helmet at the 15’s door. The camera inside his car caught Mikie ducking at the attack.

Swarmed by reporters, Robby was still not done. He raged against Mikie’s good boy image and called him a piece of *hit, which sent NASCAR announcers into a twitter of apologies. Poor Robby. This year has just not gone his way.

A little road rage on camera can be fun. That is what has historically been so entertaining about
Bristol. Loudon, however, was out of control. Maybe someone spiked the Gatorade; maybe it was a season’s worth of tension bubbling to the surface. Whatever it was, the penalties that NASCAR will be doling out will be justified and well-earned.

There was some actual racing in the midst of all of this. Chaser Kenseth came back from a pit row mistake to run well. Junior, now reunited with Tony Eury, Jr as his crew chief, pulled a top 5. And Stewart, who led for most of the race, battled hard with Newman in the final laps with each pulling past the other. Chaser Newman was the victor getting his first win of the season.