200 MPH Ramblings

Does Dale Earnhardt Jr have to be in every commercial break?

I have given up trying to figure out Nextel point standings. This past weekend, the race began with Jeff Gordon ahead of Ryan Newman in the standings. Midway through the race, Newman was 2 slots ahead of Gordon who was now 1 point behind in the standings. Then Gordon passes Newman and gets ahead of him by 7 or 8 slots. So now Gordon is back ahead in the standings, right? Nope, he was still behind, the announcers told us, without quite explaining why. Only later, when Gordon was 10 positions ahead of Newman did he finally get ahead in the standings again. Later, Newman was only 4 or 5 positions behind Gordon when the announcers informed us he had passed Gordon in the standings. Gordon finished 2 positions behind Newman and wound up 30 points down.

Congratulations to Kyle Busch for becoming the youngest Nascar race winner ever. Of course, after the race here comes some bozo with a mic (as if carrying a microphone automatically makes you smarter) asking about how frustrating it was trying to get that first win. He’s asking a kid who can’t buy a drink in a bar until next Spring about being frustrated that it took so long to win a Nascar race.

Jeff Gordon was very complimentary as always in his post race comments, while we heard last week that Junior says if he loses in the Nextel Cup Race, he hopes Gordon loses, too. Seems Junior is not wanting publicity all of a sudden. Cut to a commercial break where the first 3 commercials are all about Junior.

By the way, when Junior had car trouble and pulled into the pits, the cameras and announcers all dutifully followed him as he slowly pulled into the garage, waited patiently for him to get out, and then began an interview that lasted a good 4 or 5 minutes. All of this happened while there was still the small matter of a race still going on. Of course, Junior was no longer driving around (in 30th place), so the network must have figured no one wanted to see it anyway.

Junior fans get on Gordon for having been ‘handed’ his career. Seems that some think that Gordon's daddy made it easier for him early on, and they are mad because he did not have to ‘earn’ his way into Nascar.

This is coming from fans of Dale Earnhardt Jr? Hello, Kettle, this is the Pot…