Darling It's Not

There is nothing darling about Darlington Raceway in South Carolina. It's been called "The Lady in Black" and "The Track Too Tough To Tame" and with good reason. The track has a dark side to it. Kyle Petty once said they should fill it with water and stock it with trout.

Drivers talk about the "Darlington Stripe" which is the mark you get on your car after you brush the wall. Notice that I said "after" and not "if" you brush the wall, because you will brush the wall at Darlington, the only question is, at what point in the race.

The track is historic and of course, for the Winston Cup cars it has the Southern 500 which is one of the series' most storied races. Of course, historic is also a nice way of saying the track's old. Because of that fact, drivers put a premium on getting their cars to handle around the egg-shaped 1.3 mile oval. It can be very difficult to drive, in part because the old pavement chews the rubber right off your tires. Okay, I may be exaggerating a little there but it feels like that must be happening after five laps because the car just slides to the wall. Grip is non-existent after five laps -- and that is not an exaggeration.

This past weekend, bad weather played havoc with the schedule and all of our practice and qualifying sessions in the Busch Series were cancelled. When we unloaded our cars, it was to race. And we had to roll the dice on our set-up for the Harrah's Chevy.

We started the race according to Owners' Points which meant I lined up 23rd. With weather still a factor, we finally got the race underway for good at about 5:30 p.m. on Saturday (it was supposed to start at 1 p.m.). I faded back to 33rd as our guess on the set-up was not as good as some others' guesses. However, we had an idea of the direction we wanted to go so when I pitted, my Harrah's crew made the changes swiftly.

I had climbed back up to 25th when the yellow came out for Jamie McMurray's accident. We pitted and came back out in 26th. We didn't get the chance to see if the changes we made worked because the race was stopped when rain started falling during the caution period.

In fact they stopped the race just short of the halfway mark, so after about 40 minutes, NASCAR ordered us to re-fire the engines and we went far enough (about 1,000 feet on the track) to complete 74 of the 147 scheduled laps and thereby make the race official by NASCAR's rules. Jeff Burton, who has a knack for being in the right place at the right time during these rain-shortened events, won the race. Of course as strong as he was running that day, he probably would have won if the race had gone the full distance.

This week we head to Richmond, Virginia where we'll race Friday night. The action will be hot and heavy on that three-quarter mile banked oval, but we'll be ready for it. At this race last year I had to sit and watch because I was still too sore from my wreck at Darlington. I qualified the car but my buddy Mark Green drove the car in final practice and the race. He was going well until he had an engine problem. That was not fun watching someone else drive my Harrah's race car, even if he was a good friend.

I'm healthy this year, and I love racing at night so this weekend should be lots of fun. Tune into TNT on Friday night at 8 p.m. (Eastern Time) to catch the race. Hopefully we'll come away from Richmond all the richer for having raced there.

Notes & Quotes:

Larry Foyt on Darlington: "I've never had any luck there but I like the track. You have to be patient there. It's also a track where your tires go away after the first two laps, so tire management is key. It may be a little different this year because the tires are so hard that they wear pretty well. But I still think anytime you can get new tires, you'll take them."

Meals on Wheels Delivery: Foyt makes his eighth Meals on Wheels delivery this week as he stopped into Shreveport, La. to deliver meals to two seniors. The delivery was preceded by a press conference at the Harrah's Casino in Shreveport as Foyt works with the gaming company to raise national awareness about the plight of our nation's seniors.

Bristol Race Recap: Foyt quickly moved from his 29th starting place into the top 20 when "a two car wreck turned into a typical 10-car wreck at Bristol" just 42 laps into the race. Foyt had slowed to miss the accident but was tagged from behind by a rookie causing Foyt to hit the wall backwards, damaging the rear bumper. Despite that incident, he was looking at a 16th place finish when NASCAR black-flagged him with 30 laps to go, determining his bumper was unsafe. Pitting under green, he lost 2 laps and finished 21st.

Foyt is 18th in the NASCAR Busch Series standings; he has earned $430,340 to date.

Darlington 2001: Foyt suffered the worst accident of his NASCAR Busch Series career in the Labor Day weekend event. After experiencing an unusual set of circumstances that led to his being a lap down early in the race, he was involved in a bizarre accident which occurred under caution on lap 46. "On the restart, I was coming up on the inside to double up, but I was staying pretty low because a lot of guys were scrubbing in their tires," Foyt said. "Then out of nowhere, Steve Park came right down in front of me. I couldn't believe it. I braked but I know I didn't slow down that much before I hit him behind the door. There wasn't anything I could do. In retrospect, we were both pretty lucky."

Foyt was treated and released from the infield care center at the track while Park was airlifted to the local hospital, where he was treated for a concussion and bruised collar bone. According to published reports, Park was released Tuesday but he was out for the balance of the season. Foyt was credited with finishing 39th.

Best 2002 Start:   5th at Nashville (Apr. 13) and Kentucky (June 15)
Best 2002 Finish: 8th at Talladega (Apr. 20)