Notebook: Darrell Waltrip takes a swipe at Kornheiser

Notebook: Darrell Waltrip takes a swipe at Kornheiser


Sporting News NASCARService
(February  2011)

ESPN’s Tony Kornheiser didn’t make a lot of friends in NASCAR garages with his comments about the sport being rigged in Dale Earnhardt Jr.’s favor. The latest to give Kornheiser a piece of his mind was Fox analyst Darrell Waltrip, a three-time cup champion:
“Kornheiser needs to learn to keep his mouth shut and people maybe wouldn’t question how smart he is,” Waltrip said in a conference call Thursday. “He just blurted something out that shows how little he knows about this sport. I don’t even know if he’s been to a NASCAR race or not.
“I know in the NASCAR environment today, in that garage area, we are more transparent than ever. The cars, the engines, everything about inspection and what goes on down there is viewed by everyone—crew chiefs, crew members and NASCAR inspectors.
“Maybe he could’ve said something like that 20 years ago and everybody would’ve said, ‘Yeah, I know what he’s talking about.’ That’s just not the way it is these days.
“Dale Jr. needed to be congratulated and not convicted for winning the pole. I thought it was in really poor taste. And I think a lot of people did, too.”
Earnhardt went on to lose the top spot Wednesday after wrecking the car with which he qualified. (He now will have to start Sunday’s Daytona 500 from the rear of the field.) The same day, Kornheiser backed off from his Earnhardt comments in an interview with five-time defending Cup champion Jimmie Johnson.
Patrick feeling the effect of her inexperience at Daytona
Danica Patrick spent a good chunk of Nationwide Series practice on Thursday trying to “make friends.” Because of the draft, nobody can win without them.
To make friends, Patrick must prove herself as a worthy drafting partner. She finished 35th at Daytona last year in her only superspeedway race to date. Overall, her performance last year in that race (she ran well but wrecked) and the ARCA race produced sky-high expectations for her foray into stock cars. She did not fulfill them. Her average Nationwide finish was 28th; her best was 19th.
Expectations are more muted this year, and she says fans have to realize her experience is still relatively limited. “It’s not really Year 2,” she says. “It’s race (14).”
And that’s the problem that will slow her development in NASCAR. The only way to get better in NASCAR is to race. Until she races in NASCAR full time—and a decision on that looms perhaps this year—it’s not realistic to expect Patrick to show much improvement when she races a dozen stock car events a year and most of the field she’s competing against enter three times that.
She can’t make friends if she never sees them.
‘New’ Jeff Gordon will still be easy to find
Jeff Gordon enters 2011 with a new crew chief, new guys over the wall, a new shop and a new sponsor. The familiar No. 24 will be there, but Dupont is gone, replaced by “Drive to End Hunger.”
Early in the season, that might make it hard for fans to find Gordon on the track. For the Daytona 500, look toward the front; Gordon will start on the front row.
Gordon is one of several drivers with new-looking cars. Brad Keselowski is in the No. 2 Miller Lite Dodge, replacing Kurt Busch, who has moved to the No. 22 Pennzoil-Shell Dodge. Kevin Harvick is still in the No. 29 Chevy, but he’ll have Budweiser instead of Pennzoil-Shell.
Make no mistake—while drivers have little say in the appearance of their rides, no one wants to drive an ugly sled. “It’s a really cool looking racecar,” Gordon told reporters on Thursday. “I think they did a great job designing it.”