‘Intimidating’ memory highlights All-Star Race
It’s All-Star Weekend – in an official sense.
While Saturday night’s Sprint All-Star Race at Lowe’s Motor Speedway is billed as a non-points event where NASCAR’s biggest stars will do almost anything to win, I subscribe to the theory that every weekend is an all-star race.
After all, is there any other sport where the top athletes compete against each other on a weekly basis? You can make the point that the PGA Tour comes close, but Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson don’t play every event. It’s obviously not possible in team sports, so all of those leagues stage their versions of the all-star game once a year.
But that’s what makes NASCAR so special and unique. Every week there are 43 teams lined up to take the green flag and fans get to watch Carl Edwards compete against Matt Kenseth and Greg Biffle and Jimmie Johnson and Tony Stewart and Kyle Busch. It’s the best against the best for 36 points races and two non-points events.
Still, NASCAR’s all-star night holds a great deal of value for the teams who compete for bragging rights in front of hometown family and friends, the fans who get to whoop and holler all night long in the grandstands, and the series sponsor who gets to promote its product in front of thousands of loyal consumers at the track and on television.
Whereas Ford Championship Weekend at Homestead-Miami Speedway in November is the highlight of the season for Ford Racing, this weekend is far and away the biggest for series sponsor Sprint. I know a little bit about the importance of this event having worked for R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. in 1997 when the all-star race was known as “The Winston.”
As a media relations assistant for Sports Marketing Enterprises, my duties were to assist in promoting the event and generating stories through print and electronic outlets. In addition, I had operational duties on race night that included coordinating pre-race driver introductions. On this occasion, the drivers were asked to get into the backseat of a convertible. When their name was announced, a set of huge doors would swing open and the driver would emerge through a haze of billowing smoke and begin waving to the fans.
The plan was pretty simple. The cars would line up in the garage area and all the drivers needed to do was walk out of their hauler and find the car that had their name on the side. I was in the process of making my rounds to politely remind everyone about when we needed them to be in position, and I was feeling pretty good about things, until…
The black No. 3 hauler looked no different than any of the others that lined the garage every week, but it was and it was because of the man inside. Dale Earnhardt was known as “The Intimidator” for a reason, and while he appreciated the work RJR had done to help bring NASCAR into the mainstream of professional sports, I was still the new guy on the block and he didn’t know me that well.
I stepped through the doors and tentatively made my way down the aisle that led to the driver’s lounge. I could hear multiple voices speaking, so before I went up the steps I took a deep breath and quickly went through what I was going to say. I poked my head in and before I could even open my mouth Earnhardt barked at me, “What do you want!”
I was totally disarmed. There were five or six other people sitting with him on the L-shaped couch, and I began stuttering and stammering my way through. “We’d like you to be at your car for driver’s introduction in 10 minutes,” I said, hoping he would just nod and that would be the end of it. “Why do I have to be there so early!” he countered. My mind was totally blank. “Uh, well, that’s what the schedule says.”
“I’ll get there when I’m ready,” he said and went back to the conversation he was having with his visitors.
Only later did I realize Earnhardt wasn’t trying to be difficult. He was just having some fun and testing the new guy in front of his friends. I realized I had failed that test and failed it miserably, but took solace in the fact that I wasn’t the first and likely not the last to feel that way.
So for the next 10 minutes I paced back and forth until one by one the guys started to emerge and walk to their assigned car. There was Dale Jarrett and Terry Labonte and Darrell Waltrip and Mark Martin and Jeff Gordon and Rusty Wallace and Ricky Rudd and Jimmy Spencer and Bill Elliott.
And Dale Earnhardt. Right on time.
To learn more about Ford Racing, please log on to www.fordracing.com. If you would like an opportunity to win a trip for two to Ford Championship Weekend and a 2010 Ford Fusion, please go to www.weraceyouwin.com and register today.
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I still miss him! I know he’s upstairs looking down and just fussin’ about how things go nowadays in the race world. I’ve lost track of it and don’t watch it faithfully anymore. It’s just not the same.
Always love reading stories about Dale. I guess that was what made him so intimidating…you never knew if he was kidding or not.