2008 NASCAR running thread

And that booth is not nearly as awful as every booth with a Waltrip brother in it.

 

Your opinions on NASCAR now officially suck!
That's the big thing I miss when NASCAR leaves Fox; D.W. I Love his insight. He has good chemistry with Larry Mac.
I could do with the booggity, booggity... thing, but he's my favorite color guy of NASCAR announcers.

 

Dead. To. Me. Much prefer Kyle Petty or Sourpuss Dale Jarrett any day. With Darryl in the booth, it's all about Darryl.

 

I don't mind DW. When I first started covering racing six years ago I figured I better start watching it so I knew what I was writing about. It was DW and Larry Mac that helped me learn the sport. Not only would they tell you what needed to be done to a car to make it drive better, but they'd also tell why it needed to be done and exactly why it would help the car.

All that said, I really liked Benny Parsons. Only talked to him one time, but he made it as if we'd known each other for 20 years.

 

It's spelled Darrell.

 

Actually, it's spelled Jaws.

There's a bar here in town with some graffiti to the effect that it's spelled turd.

 

A little breaking news, if you care (this is a little rough, I was kinda in a hurry):

DAVID POOLE
dpoole@charlotteobserver.com
Chip Ganassi Racing with Felix Sabates is cutting its Sprint Cup operations from three to two teams, pulling the plug on the No. 40 Dodge team that has been racing without full-time sponsorship this season.
That means that 2007 Indianapolis 500 winner and IndyCar Series champion Dario Franchitti will not race in this weekend’s Coke Zero 400. The Ganassi team will enter the No. 41 Dodge driven by Reed Sorenson and the No. 42 Dodges driven by Juan Pablo Montoya.
In a statement issued Tuesday afternoon, the team said it remains committed to Franchitti’s development as a stock car driver and is discussing options with the driver, including the possibility of running him in the remainder of the 2008 Nationwide Series in the No. 40 Dodge.
“This is a difficult decision for Felix and I that did not come without its share of anguish,” team owner Chip Ganassi said. “In this tough business environment continuing to run the car without proper funding has become increasingly difficult.”
Franchitti, 35, won 18 races in the Championship Auto Racing Teams and IndyCar Series competition. But his stock car career has not took flight after he came over to start the 2008 after edging fellow Ganassi driver Scott Dixon to win last year’s IndyCar title.
Franchitti’s best finish in 10 Cup starts was a 22nd at Martinsville. He then failed to qualify for the next race at Texas Motor Speedway, then suffered an ankle injury in a crash in a Nationwide Series race at Talladega. Franchitti returned after missing five races and ran at Pocono and Michigan, but then failed to qualify for the race on the road course at Infineon Raceway.
After turning in his best Cup qualifying effort and starting seventh at New Hampshire International Speedway on Sunday, he finished four laps down in 38th place.
Franchitti has also competed in 14 Nationwide races, with a best finish of sixth at Las Vegas Motor Speedway earlier this year. He also ran a Truck Series race at Martinsville and an Automobile Racing Club of America event at Talladega last fall.
Franchitti, born in Edinburgh, Scotland, was part of the winning team for this year’s Rolex 24 at Daytona. That allowed him to become the only driver to win the Indianapolis 500, the IndyCar title, the 12 Hours of Sebring and the Rolex 24 at Daytona in a calendar year. Mario Andretti and A.J. Foyt are the only other drivers to have won all four of those titles in a racing career.

 

Thank you, David.

Not a big surprise; I think that car's had a different paint job or ginormous vinyl decal every week this year.

Does this mean Doug Yates' "6 teams that will shut down at the end of the year" are now down to 5?

 

4. Bill Davis Racing already closed a team.

 

Doug's prediction of 6 came long after the Jacquesperiment failed and referred to shutdowns at the end of this year.

So ... 5.

I figure the 7, 34 and 49 are toast at the end of the year — the 49 may already be toast, but BAM Racing claims to be coming back in the fall (we shall see). So ... two more.

 

Anyone have any insight on how a marketable name like Dario (not to mention his hot wife) with a recent open-wheel championship can't get a sponsorship and people are throwing money at Michael Waltrip?