| | Well, I told you to keep track of that irritating statistic "points as of now" to maybe learn something as you watched the races at New Hampshire and Dover.
And, wow! Did we ever!
Now, it's onto the "short" and "long" of it, Martinsville and Talladega, with Charlotte sandwiched in between.
|  | | Bobby Labonte just needs to stay out of trouble the next few weeks to win his first Winston Cup title. |
The only number that matters now is this one -- 249.
You will hear, over and over, for the next week or two: "Remember what Alan Kulwicki did in 1992."
But, I'm not going to dwell on that issue -- I'll leave that to the guys with no imagination. But it's not what Kulwicki did to win the championship, but rather what Bill Elliott and Davey Allison did not do. They did not "finish".
Bobby Labonte has gone from being inconsistent to being a finisher. In 1992, Elliott could not finish. He was 30th in a 31-car field at Martinsville; 26th in a 32-car field at North Wilkesboro; 30th at Charlotte; 4th at Rockingham; 31st at Phoenix and finally the win at Atlanta.
But by Atlanta, it was 10 points too little.
The same could be said for Davey Allison. He was taken out in a crash in the Atlanta finale, and finished 27th after heading into the race as the point leader, with a 30-point advantage over Kulwicki
Give Kulwicki and his crew all the credit in the world, they deserve it. But if Elliott had improved on almost any of those finishes, Kulwicki's amazing charge would have fallen short, and would not rekindle the memories it does now.
Today we face a similar situation. Races dwindling. Pressure mounting. Excitement building. Buckle up, Virginia! We're heading for Martinsville.
This is another weekend that Labonte will face the fact that history is not on his side. He was 12th at Martinsville in the spring. He has five top-10 finishes in 15 starts there. Yet, he has never had a top-five finish there.
But, following the thinking that it's the bad finishes that hurt you, he has finished in the top-15 in eight of the last eleven races. The other three finishes are 24th, 27th and 21st. He was eighth in this race last year.
Recent history, however, is on his side. I'm talking about this season. We all know how he has run in 2000. If he stays on that pace, no one will catch him.
Down the stretch last year, Dale Jarrett roped in the championship with a solid, if not flamboyant fashion. Of course, there was no need to be flamboyant, he just had to be good.
Jarrett was 10th at Martinsville, seventh at Charlotte, second to the other Dale at Talladega, fourth at Rockingham, sixth at Phoenix, fifth at Homestead and second in Atlanta.
That would be seven straight top-10s to finish the season. Last year, Labonte finished the season with ten straight top-10 finishes. Jarrett went to Martinsville leading by 257 points. Labonte goes to Martinsville leading by 249 points.
Jarrett's lead was trimmed by just six points that day at Martinsville because Mark Martin, who started the day second in points, finished 16th and fell to third in points behind Jarrett and Labonte.
At Charlotte, Jarrett lost 29 points when he finished seventh. He was still 222 in front when he went to Talladega, finished second and gained 24 points. That's when they started polishing the trophy for him.
Martinsville is a race track where you don't have to make any mistakes to have a lousy day. You just have to run into someone else that is having a bad day and you'll be miserable for a week. There is nowhere to hide at Martinsville, and nowhere to go when someone in front of you jams on the brakes so they can pick up the CD they dropped on the floor.
Labonte's team is trying to "bullet proof" its cars. The No. 18 team wants to eliminate the mechanical nightmares, like what happened with the power-steering fitting at Richmond. After that Saturday night disappointment, they spent Sunday at the race shop, basically pulling the New Hampshire car off the rig, and going through it bumper to bumper to try and insure it would be free of mechanical woes.
The team overlooked a potential problem that ended up costing them at Richmond. Crew chief Jimmy Makar is determined to not let something like that happen again. Not only did it cause them to finish 15th with a top-five car, Jimmy broke a flashlight, too. And that really made him mad! Ask him about sometime.
I know this sounds like something your father said as he sent you to your room with no TV as a punishment for screwing up as a kid (not that I would know), but the failure at Richmond could turn out to be a key to success for Labonte and company. The finish at Richmond didn't hurt that much, in fact, mathematically speaking, the Interstate Batteries team gained points. When you think about the lesson they learned, it may have been a good trade off. We'll ask them after Atlanta.
As for Sunday, it used to be that if you took care of your brakes at Martinsville, and you could stay out of trouble, you would have a shot at the win. But most teams will admit that brake technology has grown so fast, that brakes are no longer the biggest concern at Martinsville. You will still see the occasional car or cars with brake problems, but it is more the exception than the rule today.
The key on Sunday is getting through the turns without hitting anything -- or getting hit by anything -- and then having the power to accelerate off the turns and hustle down the straightway, trying to wedge your way around the guy in front of you while the guy behind you has the same plan for you.
It's a long and daring day for such a short track. This is a "throwback" race. A race the way it was in the early days, you know, like when Benny was racing. Just kidding BP.
It's the shortest track on the circuit, packed with 43 cars, with one guy hunting for the championship, and three guys hunting him.
Of course, there are other battles for point positions, but, really, right now, the race is for the win on Sunday and the champagne in New York.
Points-as-of-now? It may seem like an unimportant "stat" to you, but if you're on Bobby Labonte's team, it's as critical as a fitting on a power-steering hose. | |
ALSO SEE
Ask Bill Weber
|
