Rain Wins Saturday, Schatz Takes Sunday

Saturday night’s program at the Knoxville Nationals was frustrating. The weather forecast called for a slight chance for storms in the evening with an increasing chance after midnight, so from that standpoint it looked like we would get the show in. Looking at the radar at six o’clock told us otherwise.

Perhaps the most frustrating part of the evening was the fact that we had some of the most interesting potential storylines in the lineups from the C-Main all the way up to the A-Main as I can remember in some time. For example, Sammy Swindell looked fantastic racing his way to the front in Friday night’s A-Main and it was going to be fun to see if he could go from eleventh to first or second and transfer out of the C-Main. You had Jason Meyers starting 11th and Danny Lasoski 17th in the B-Main, so you knew that was going to be fun to watch, and not only did you have the A-Main with a bit of a mini-invert with Schatz starting sixth, but you also had “The King” slated to start from 20th. No doubt, it was going to be a fantastic night of racing!

The first shower came just prior to the opening ceremonies so the E-Main was a single-file affair on a one-lane track won by Bill Rose. We were five laps into the D-Main when Ricky Montgomery appeared to have something break as he made a hard right turn into the turn two wall. While the rescue crews worked on Montgomery, who reportedly suffered a fractured leg in the accident, the rains came once again causing a delay of about one hour. With seven laps remaining the D-Main cars were given some hot laps prior to going back to racing and I found it interesting to see that every one of them ran the same low line around the wet racetrack. I could see why the drivers running first, second and third would stay on that low line as they had transfer positions in their grasp. But why, if you are restarting fourth on back would you not go up and run this set of hot laps in the middle of the speedway to try to get the track wide enough for you to have a legitimate shot at passing someone? The result, the top three stayed where they restarted with Kaley Gharst, Toni Lutar and Josh Schneiderman advancing to the C.

The radar on my Blackberry showed that the next bigger storm was fast approaching and the lightning to the south and west confirmed that as the C-Main took to the speedway. With the narrow racetrack Swindell’s opportunity to make a run to the front was all but wiped out, but the veteran gave it his best shot as he moved up to seventh at the finish with Wayne Johnson and Billy Alley moving on to the B. As soon as the checkers waved on the C-Main we headed for the pass out gate as I was willing to risk missing out on watching the A-Main hot laps for the head start on getting out of the grandstands before this next storm hit. The rain started to fall just as we walked out the gate and by the time we made it five blocks to where we had parked we were completely drenched. Looking at the radar and seeing yet another round of showers about thirty minutes away it did not surprise me one bit when the announcement came that the rest of the show would be run on Sunday night. But with Morgan having to head back to school in Tulsa on Sunday, and with me basically worn out from twelve straight nights at the racetrack I decided that listening to Bill W give the call on Hosehead’s Radio was the best route for me rather than making the ninety-five mile journey back to Knoxville. I think that my wife Christine appreciated that decision as well.

I was glad to hear that the racing was good on Sunday night. Both Meyers and Lasoski made strong runs in the B to get themselves into the top four and transferred up to the A-Main. Steve Kinser made a big move early coming from 20th to ninth and apparently made one heck of a save just before a caution for another driver. Joey Saldana and Stevie Smith swapped the lead early before Saldana gained control and, just as I thought would happen, Donny Schatz was the fastest car at the end taking the lead from Saldana with five laps remaining then driving away for his fourth straight Nationals title. What can you say? Schatz is the man here right now much the same as Steve Kinser was back in the early 90’s and until somebody can knock him off he will be the guy that everybody loves to hate here in August.

Sounds to me like the much ballyhooed fuel stop was a non-issue as it came during a natural stoppage of the race anyway, so hopefully that subject will die off now on the message boards. Frankly I was shocked at some of the pure hate that is being shown by the AWP’s the past few weeks as several of them were basically saying that everybody should stay away from Knoxville because of this reason or that reason. I always wonder when I read this stuff whether or not that person has actually ever been to this event or not and if they really feel so strongly about what they are saying, why not sign their real name to it? At least then we could no longer call them an AWP or Anonymous Weasel Poster.

Do I like the concept of a “fuel stop”? Not really, but only if you have to throw a caution or a red just to have the stop, otherwise it is a non-issue as far as I’m concerned. I do like the concept of more laps, and frankly as a fan I don’t mind bunching the field up once again mid-race. Next year the A-Main will be fifty laps and the Nationals will be paying out just over one million dollars to the competitors. As long as they don’t get too radical, I think they can do what they want when they are paying out that kind of cash!

The one thing that I do believe though is this, having “live” television coverage of the Nationals is not helping ticket sales for the event. Back when the only option was to buy an infield pass on Saturday because every seat in both sets of grandstands were full, then live television made sense. Now….not so much. In my opinion the action, the speed and the atmosphere of any dirt track racing event does not come through when televised and it is through no fault of the fine people who are putting together the telecast. It just doesn’t translate well!

I’ve heard others make the argument that we have to have it on live TV in order to expose the sport to the casual fan. Well, if that adrenaline rush from the extra sights, smells, and action cannot be transmitted through the television then perhaps the “casual fan” appreciates that they can watch the Nationals for FREE, but are in no way motivated to invest in the trip and the ticket required to see it in person. Seems to me that the crowd for this event grew year after year based upon good ol’ word of mouth advertising as race fans like myself would tell others “you have to go to the Knoxville Nationals sometime!” I think that it is time that we get back to that.

Despite the frustration caused by Mother Nature this week, I’ll be buying my four-night ticket package when the renewals come out in November. It’s the Knoxville Nationals, I wouldn’t want to miss it!

A big thanks to Allan Holland at www.hoseheads.com for linking the “Back Stretch” up this week!