Nascar's road course races have earned the reputation for being uneventful and not providing a lot of excitement or controversy. But in the last two years, that's is beginning to change. Last season saw beating and banging and half the field wound up pissed at Jeff Gordon by the end of the race. Would this years race be able to follow that?
Joey Logano led the field to green, but he quickly surrendered the lead to Kurt Busch. Busch quickly proved his Dodge would be the car to beat and would lead by as much as two seconds. But in behind the lead cars was were the real action was happening.
Bumping and grinding normally reserved tracks like Brisol and Martinsville was prevalent as drivers jockeyed for position around the 11-turn Napa Valley road course. The first big skirmish of the day occurred when Kyle Busch slid into the dirt off turn ten and when he came back onto the track, Brian Vickers was forced to slide in front of Tony Stewart. This irked Smoke off, so he pushed Vickers into turn eleven and spun him out. This collected several other cars, most notably Dale Junior. He knocked a hole in his radiator causing his motor to eventually blow up, sending the No. 88 out of the race.
Later in the race, Robby Gordon and Joey Logano got into it. The battle ended with Logno stuffing Gordon into the turn eleven wall. Gordon said on his radio after the incident that the "20 is going in the fence." That never happened, but after the race, Gordon said "He took me out. i passed him clean and I guess he didn't think it was clean. i guess I need to pull a Childress on him, just not at the racetrack." Logano saw things a bit differently. "He drives like a moron every week" the Gibbs Racing driver said. "We were a lot faster than him. I got outside of him...and he knocked my fender in. So I had enough of it..."
There was payback though. Tony Stewart messed with the Red Bull and got the horns because Vickers hooked Stewart, spinning him backwards, and allowing the rear of the car to climb the tire barrier. As Stewart's car hung there in the hairpin, Vickers made his way to the garage area.
After the race, Stewart said that he knew Vickers wrecked him as payback and didn't blame him for it, but he thought that Red Bull driver was trying to block him. Smoke said that was why he dumped the No. 83 car. "I don't care if it was Ryan Newman (the other car Stewart owns). I would have dumped him, too." He also said that "until Nascar makes a rule against it I am going to dump them every time for it." Vickers also admitted to dumping Stewart on purpose, but said that "he made his bed at that moment and he had to sleep in it." Vickers went on to say " I think when he sees the replay and he realizes why I went low - if he looks at it out of my front windshield - he'll realize it had nothing to do with him."
The last major pileup occurred when Juan Montoya dumped Kasey Kahne at the top of the turn one hill. The next lap, Brad Keselowski dumped Montoya at the top of the next hill. Montoya said "it' s hard when people think they know how to race on road courses and they think they do. It's okay." Kahne also got a jab in at Montoya's expense, saying "last year, when (the Earnhardt Ganassi cars) were really, really good and Jamie McMurray was the man, Juan still couldn't win a race. That shows about what he can do here in Nascar anyways."
While all this wrecking and controversy was taking place, Kurt Busch was making his getaway. He beat Jeff Gordon and Carl Edwards to the line for his first points win of the season and the first road course win of his career. Next week, the Sprint Cup Series returns to the "World Center of Racing", the Daytona International Speedway. We saw in February what a difference the two car draft has made on the racing. This race is going to be a good one because, honestly, anybody can win it.
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