Tom Higgins' Scuffs

In Fine Voice To Crow.

   There's good news for fans of Fox Sports racing analyst Darrell Waltrip.
   The three-time NASCAR driving champion has regained his voice and will be part of the television team airing the Goody's Cool Orange 500 on Sunday at Martinsville Speedway in Virginia.
   Two weeks ago Waltrip was suffering from inflamed vocal chords and it was painful to listen to the  rasping as he tried to fulfill his duties during the Food City 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway.
    Now, Waltrip has recovered sufficiently  to even crow, if he wishes, about the most controversial of the 11 victories he scored at the Martinsville short track, second only to Richard Petty's record 15 triumphs.
   I hope Waltrip will touch on that win in the  Goody's 500 on Sept. 27, 1987, because it remains among the most memorable incidents at the .526-mile layout that dates to 1949.  To get the checkered flag, Waltrip essentially wrecked both Dale Earnhardt and Terry Labonte and passed them in the race's last quarter-mile.
   "I shot into Terry, Terry shot into Dale and I shot into the lead!" a grinning, gleeful Waltrip said in Victory Lane.

   As Waltrip gloated, both Earnhardt and Labonte growled.
   "It's one of those deals where you win by doing anything you can," said Labonte.
   "If there had been 10 laps left, NASCAR (officials) say they would have brought Darrell in for consultation," said Earnhardt.  "But it was the last lap, so they ain't going to do nothing."
   Earnhardt was right.
   A NASCAR spokesman shortly declared the three-car tangle "a racing accident" and the finish of Waltrip, Earnhardt and Labonte was ruled official.
   "Amen!" shouted Darrell in the press box in the midst of a post-race interview.
   Here's how the wild windup unfolded almost 21 years ago at Martinsville:
   With just six laps to go in the 263-mile race Earnhardt held a seemingly insurmountable lead of 9.2 seconds, or about a half-lap.  It appeared he was certain to push his short track record in 1987 to 7-0.
   Then, on the 495th lap,  a cut tire caused Ken Schrader's car to tag the wall in turn four.  Bobby Allison spun as he took evasive action.
   The caution flag showed and all three leaders--Earnhardt, Labonte and Waltrip--dashed onto pit road for new tires.
   The restart came on Lap 498 and Earnhardt was able to hold the lead until the flagstand loomed just around turn four, 200 yards or so ahead.
   At this point Waltrip's right front quarter panel made contact with Labonte's left rear.  Labonte wobbled and caromed off Waltrip into Earnhardt, who also lost control.
   It looked like billiard balls bouncing off each other.
   And Waltrip's car was the cue ball.
   Waltrip, diving low, went around both rivals and sped to the finish line.  Earnhardt recovered in time to take the runnerup spot, 7.1 seconds behind.  Labonte salvaged third.
   "It would have been nice not to hit anybody," Waltrip said upon finally getting his first victory of 1987 after going 0-for-23 as a new member of the Hendrick Motorsports operation.  "But on the last lap when a track is slick and the brakes are worn down, anything can happen.
   "Terry gave me a little room on the inside.  It looked like he got alongside Earnhardt and that left me some room to make a move."
   Labonte, who had succeeded Waltrip in the ride fielded by legendary Junior Johnson, didn't see it this way.  Not at all.
   "On the last lap I was on the outside of Dale as we went into the second turn," said Labonte.  "He tried to put me into the wall and damn near succeeded.  I scraped the wall hard, but managed to pull in behind him.
   "As we went into the third turn, Darrell never lifted off the throttle, and he ran right over both me and Dale and took us out."
   Immediately after the tangle the crews of Earnhardt and Labonte had a confrontation on pit road.  They thought their drivers had wrecked each other and that Waltrip wasn't involved.  Then, they learned differently, and the barbs flew Waltrip's way.
   "Everything Waltrip's done in his career has supposedly been right and made him think that he's too good to do something like that," huffed Tim Brewer, Labonte's crew chief.  "Well, the halo sure didn't shine today.  I guess the evil in everyone comes out. 
   "What NASCAR should have done when Darrell came to the line is hold the checkered flag, then wave it for Dale as the winner with Terry second."
   Said Kirk Shelmerdine, Earnhardt's crew chief:  "It's disappointing not to get our seventh short track win in as many races.  I can accept getting outrun, but I can't accept getting robbed.  My wife's purse was stolen here in the spring and now I know how she feels."
   If Waltrip, with his recently regained voice, opts not to crow about  his '87 "two-for-one" pool-table-like move, he can tell a touching story instead.
   When Waltrip got into his race car  that day he found a rose with a note attached.
   The note read, "Honey, this is for you.  Win one for me."
   The name on the note was Jessica Leigh, and she was the infant daughter born to Darrell and his wife Stevie just 10 days earlier in Nashville, Tenn.
   "It hurts my heart to think about the controversey happening at the end of the race after getting that rose and the note," Waltrip conceded at the time.  His voice cracked slightly and his hands tremembled a bit.
   He quickly recovered, however, to add, "As most fans know, I like to nickname my race cars.  However, this one didn't have a name.  It does now--Rosy."

An Australian Adventure, Part V

 

PROLOGUE: In late February of 1988 NASCAR sanctioned what amounted to an exhibition race in Australia at a sparkling new speedway near Melbourne, The Thunderdome.  It held the potential of being a great adventure for those lucky enough to be going, including me.  The trip proved more than equal to the promise, including a dramatic victory by Neil Bonnett.  This is the final installment of a five-part series.

   My motorsports journalist pal, Steve Waid, and I were driving to The Thunderdome on  race morning of the Goodyear 500K in a fog.
   Not a meterological  mist, but one of the personal variety.
   We had lingerered too long--into the very wee hours--at the Old Melbourne Hotel's piano bar.  Friendly Australian racing fans, excited in the extreme to have NASCAR in their country, insisted on buying Steve and I, plus all the other Americans present, round-after-round of drinks.
   Additionally, the music was great.
   The pianist was a sleepy-eyed lookalike of Bobby Rahal, an Indy Car driver at the time who now fields cars for Danica Patrick.  In fact, we called him "Bobby."
   Steve and I arrived at the bar early--the first customers there, in fact--determined to stump the piano player.  That was something we'd been trying to do all week without success.  The man knew every song we suggested.
   "I think I've finally got him," I told Steve.
   "Hey, 'Bobby,' how about playin' the ol' San Antonio Rose!"

   
      

   The guy looked at me in disdain.
   Not only did he play the great Bob Wills classic,  he embellished it with a prelude.
   "I give up," I said.
   About this time a young couple walked in and joined us at the edge of the piano.
   Steve requested the song "Memory" from Cats.
   The young woman started singing--BEAUTIFULLY!
   We raved.  We told her we were going to be her agents.  We said we were going to take her home with us back to The States and make her a major star.
   She laughed, then sang show tune after show tune, even Gilbert & Sullivan.
   More young Aussies arrived and joined in the jolly, musical partying.  They sang marvelously, too.
   We offered to be their agents as well.
   Finally, an Australian sports writer I'd befriended sidled up to me and whispered, "They've strung you and Stevie-boy along far enough.  They're from the Australian company of Cats, and their show is 'black' tonight."
   Even being thoroughly embarassed couldn't force us from the bar.   Knowing full well we had a race to cover within a few hours, we nevertheless closed the place down.
   After about 45 minutes of  sleep we were off to the speedway a few miles away at Calder Park, leaving early in hopes of beating the traffic.
   As expected, the highway was jammed.  The race had created tremendous excitement Down Under.
   After a pre-race show worthy of Charlotte promoter Humpy Wheeler, who had advised Thunderdome founder Bob Jane, the main event began before a standing-room-only crowd of 46,000 that mobbed the new 1.15-mile track.
   The fans weren't to be disappointed.
   Neil Bonnett, Bobby Allison and Dave Marcis put on a thrilling performance, running inches apart and dicing for the lead.
   Some of us in the "Yank" media contingent jokingly commented the three drivers were in a "Blue Angels Formation."
   "You mean it's planned!?" an Aussie writer asked incredulously.
   Didn't say that.
   Whatever, Bonnett rolled to the checkered flag in a Pontiac, finishing .86 seconds of his friend and mentor, Allison, who was driving a Buick.  Marcis took third place in a Chevrolet, the only other driver to complete all 280 laps.
   It was a touched--and touching--Neil Bonnett who accepted the accolades of  Australian fans after scoring his second straight victory.  The Alabamian had won NASCAR Winston Cup Series' Pontiac 400 the previous Sunday at Richmond.
   The popular Bonnett unsuccessfully fought tears as he answered questions in a post-race interview held in a large tent behind pit road.  Allison and Marcis, flanking Bonnett, similarly had a tough time with their emotions.
   Bonnett had crushed his right leg the previous October in the Oakwood Homes 500 at Charlotte Motor Speedway.  It was an injury that seemed to threaten his racing career.
   "Not many people know how bad that wreck really was," said Bonnett.  "I busted my butt, and it almost led to me quitting, giving up ever racing again.
   "When I went through the therapy that was prescribed for me during the winter, I often had tears in my eyes because it hurt so bad and the regimen was so tough.  But I committed myself.  I made the decision then that I was going to use everything I had learned to go out and have a great season this year.
   "I said I wasn't going to be concerned about wrecking cars.  I wasn't going to be concerned about getting hurt.  I told myself, 'Neil, you can break your other leg, and it won't hurt as long as you do it while going for the lead.'
   "I'm convinced that I can come back from the injury that has left me limping pretty bad--and I'm sensitive about that--to have my best season."
   Bonnett shook his head.
   "I don't even know what this race paid to win," he continued.  "I don't care.
   "I just wanted to come down here and race door-to-door with somebody, like I did Bobby and Dave.  I wanted to give these fans and Bob Jane something to remember.  I hope we provided  those moments, and from the response at the end I think we did.  That means a lot to me.
   "By no means was this just another race.  I didn't think that, and I hope no one else does.  I'll be honest...When 'The Star Spangled Banner' is sung at a lot of races, I don't pay much attention.  I'm busy buckling into the car, getting my helmet adjusted and being sure the radio is right.
   "But down here today...Well, they had my buddy and fellow driver, Kyle Petty, sing our national anthem.  It meant so much to me that I stayed out of the car until it was over.  I got goose bumps hearing him and looking at our flag.  I dwelled on every word."
   At this point, it seemed as if Bonnett might not be able to go on, but he continued:
  "This race is so historic, I wish me and Bobby both could have won.  That would have been perfect.  But we know that doesn't happen.  It would have been a beautiful ending, considering our friendship.
   "I can tell this story now.  Those days after the Charlotte wreck, when I was in the hospital in Concord (N.C.) were the worst  I've ever known.  The people were wonderful, but the prognosis was that I was going to lose my leg.  I was crying.  I was really low.
   "Then Bobby came by.  He was very firm.  He said, 'You can't give up.  I won't let you give up.'   That reassured me.
   "And what a fate life deals.  Here we are battling each other for the first NASCAR victory in Australia.  I know Bobby Allison, and if I hadn't raced him for it he would have eat my fanny out."
   An Aussie journalist asked Bonnett, who led the final 35 laps in averaging 101.670 mph, what he might do if the leg injury starts acting up later in the Winston Cup season.
   "After having all the fun of winning down here, I don't care if it hurts like a toothache the rest of the year," answered Bonnett.  "It'll just be along for the ride."
   For about the tenth time I had to wipe the tears from my cheeks.
   I looked around, and most of the Aussie fans who were standing 10-to-15 deep at the ropes around the tent were crying, too.
   I went over to ask one of them his assessment of all that transpired that day.  His name was Peter Gray, a house painter from Calder Park.
   I'll remember forever what he said:
   "I'm a man of modest means.  But I bought tickets and brought my four sons here because I felt they were going to see Australian history in the making.  They've been excited beyond belief, and that excites me beyond belief.
   "Richard Petty and Dale Earnhardt are the Yank drivers we'd really like to see.  For now, though, our hearts belong to Neil Bonnett."

   Epilogue:   Neil Bonnett returned to the U.S. to make it three victories in a row the following Sunday in the Goodwrench 500 at N.C. Motor Speedway.  It was the 18th and final big-time triumph of his career.  A head injury suffered in a crash during the TranSouth 500 at Darlington Raceway on April 1, 1990, sidelined Bonnett until late summer of 1993, when he began a comeback attempt as a driver, giving up his much-lauded job as a motorsports TV analyst.  Bonnett lost his life at age 47 on Feb. 11, 1994 when he crashed while practicing for the Daytona 500.
   Several NASCAR drivers returned Down Under for races at The Thunderdome in December of 1988 and December of '89.   The event featuring Winston Cup-type cars  was discontinued in 1990.  The Thunderdome's tri-oval track fell into disrepair some years ago and no longer is in use.  However, racing continues on the facility's road course.

 

An Australian Adventure, Part IV

   PROLOGUE: In late February of 1988 NASCAR sanctioned what amounted to an exhibition rce in Australia at a sparkling new speedway near Melbourne, The Thunderdome.  It held the potential of being a great adventure for those lucky enough to be going, including me.  The trip proved more than equal to the promise.  Over the next few day, "Scuffs" will recount some of the stories from two decades ago, including a dramatic victory by Neil Bonnett.

    Our days Down Under were drawing rapidly to a close, yet there remained  a lot that my pals and I wanted to do.
   Highest on our list was getting out into the countryside in the hope of seeing wild kangaroos and koalas.
   With only a couple days remaining before the running of the Goodyear 500K at The Thunderdome, buddies Steve Waid, Bob Kelly and I decided it was now or never.
   We made the plans.  We'd awaken early and go to the track at Calder Park .  Steve and I would quickly file stories for our publications, Winston Cup Scene and The Charlotte Observer, respectively.  Bob would fulfill his duties as a public relations representative for Winston, and we'd be off.
   Then, we decided to modify the schedule.
   At a dinner party the night before we'd met   a charming Aussie chap named Nick le Souef.  He could have been the inspiration for the popular movie character Crocodile Dundee.
   Nick owned a fancy opal shop in downtown Melbourne called Lightning Ridge and he enthusiastically invited us to drop by and see his place, the beautiful gems and the other things of interest that he kept there--critters.   Some very dangerous critters.

   

  Nick greeted us warmly at the door and ushered us in.
   My jaw dropped.

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   One wall of the large shop was made up of cages fronted by thick glass.  In  the cages were mainly snakes and  spiders.
   In a bin filled with water was a relatively small octopus.  It was snow white except for a blue ring around its body.
   If octopi can be beautiful, this one qualified.
   I asked about it.
   "Aye, the blue ring octopus,"  le Seouf said with a smile.  "It's found along our coast.  Its bite contains enough venom to kill 10 men."
   We moved on along the wall,  Nick  serving as tour guide and telling his intriguing life story.
   "I once was an opal miner," he said.  "Australia produces 90 percent of the opals in the world.
   "And you don't have to know anything much about geology to find them and make a fabulous fortune.  You just have to be lucky.  Ninety-nine percent of it is luck.  It only costs 50 cents to stake a claim out in the wilds, which includes practically the whole interior of the country.  If you stake it in the right place, you're a millionaire."
   Nick figured the odds and decided to make his fortune marketing opals, not mining them.  He opened Lightning Ridge.
   Meanwhile, le Seouf maintained his boyhood interest in the deadly creatures found in his country.
   "Australia is the most poisonous nation in the world," he continued.  "It's a toxicologist's dream.  For example, no other country has a spider as dangerous as our tunnelweb, which is very aggressive."
   As if on cue, a large, dark-colored spider came crawling from a web that looked something like a horn-of-plenty and stared us down through the glass.
   Next we came to a collection of snakes.  One was curled up sleeping.  It bore resemblance to the common blacksnake back home in the United States.  I pecked on the glass.  The snake uncoiled in a flash, a large hood sprang out about its head and it struck the glass that thankfully separated us.
   I recoiled in horror, much to the delight of le Seouf.
   "That's our Aussie tiger snake," he said.  "It's one of the very, very most poisonous in the world.  Its bite has enough venom to kill 60 adults.  Although not as well known, it is far more poisonous than the cobra of India and the rattler of Amrica.
   "Tigers are responsible for more deaths annually in Australia than any other snake.  And they're quite numerous.  This one was caught within eight miles of downtown Melbourne."
   Beautiful.
   While Bob Kelly shopped for an opal, Steve and I checked out some clippings on a bulletin board about our host le Souef.
   Included were stories from Melbourne newspapers about him once spending 21 days in a booth with two tiger snakes and 500 redback spiders, which is similar to the black widow of North America.  Another time he spent 24 hours in a pool with man-eating sharks, sting rays and several of those fearsome blue ring octopuses.
   Finally, it was time to go.  We thanked Nick for the experience he'd provided us and set off for the race track.
   At the speedway, I decided to write a story on a character relatively as colorful and interesting as Nick le Seouf--Hershel McGriff.
   In visiting Australia for the Goodyear 500K, McGriff embellished an already incredible motorsports record:
   --In May of 1950 he won the first Mexican road race, a gruelling cross-country, border-to-border test of 2,178 miles.
  --He started the first Southern 500 in September of 1950, NASCAR’s original big track event at Darlington (S.C.) Raceway.
  --He had been a member of the first team to enter and drive a U.S. stock car in the famous 24 Hours of Le Mans in France, co-piloting a Dodge with NASCAR’s Dick Brooks in 1976.
  McGriff, 61 at the time of the Aussie inaugural, looked far younger. People teased the legendary NASCAR Winston West competitor and champion about finding The Fountain Of Youth somewhere in the woods near his home at Bridal Veil, Ore.
  “I’ve been racing 40 years and I’m just as happy to be a part of this Australian event as I was to be at Ciudad Juarez and Darlington in 1950,” said McGriff. “It means a lot to me to be able to participate in things that turn out to be historic. Although the facilities here are much improved over what Darlington had way back then, the excitement and aura about Sunday’s race remind me a lot of South Carolina in 1950.
  “I went to Darlington because I met Bill France Sr. (NASCAR’s founder) and Curtis Turner, who were co-driving in the Mexican race.  During the overnight stops, Bill worked on me to come to Darlington.  I won in Mexico, so I decided to take the money and go to South Carolina that Labor Day.
  “I drove my race car home from Mexico, and I drove it to South Carolina to race there.
  “I’ll never forget the sight of that first field at Darlington. They started 75 cars three abreast. The field stretched from the start-finish line halfway back around the track.”
  McGriff finished ninth in the first Southern 500, and he was destined to do well in the Australian Goodyear 500K.
  With our work done, Bob, Steve and I asked some Aussie friends we’d made where we should head to hopefully see some ‘roos.
  They named a village in mountainous country about 50 miles away.
  Within an hour or so we found ourselves on a winding dirt road bordered by large fields and hills that were increasingly forested.
  The road got narrower and rougher, and no ‘roos had been spotted. It was getting late in the afternoon.
  “We better head back or we’re going to get lost,” said Steve.
  At that moment I saw two men standing by the road up ahead. “Stop and let me talk to them,” I said.
  “I don’t know, boy,” replied Steve. “They look pretty rough.”
  Both men had beards halfway down their chests. They looked like characters out of the movie     “Deliverance” and they were eyeing us menacingly.
  By now all the Fosters I’d consumed had kicked in and I was overflowing with bravado.

“I can talk to anybody,” I asserted. “Stop the car!”

  As I stepped out I extended my hand and with my best Southern drawl said, “Howdy, boys! Could you tell a feller where he might see a ‘roo?”
  I doubt the men would have been much more surprised if a Flying Saucer had landed and little green men emerged.
  “Mate, where the ‘ell are you from!?” asked one.
“North Carolina.”
  The two guys almost knocked each other down getting to me to shake my hand.
  “Damn, mate!” they exclaimed. “You’re down here for the race!”
  Seemed everyone in the country knew about the event and was excited about it.
  After talking racing a bit, the chaps informed us that we weren’t going to see any ‘roos until after dark.
  “But we’re surprised you haven’t run over some koalas,” they said. “These woods are full of ‘em. Just look to the tops of the trees as you head back.”
  Sure enough.
  We hadn’t driven a quarter-mile until we saw koalas clinging to limbs.
  We stopped, hustled out and, cameras at the ready, walked to the trees to get better photos.
  Suddenly, I remembered the tiger snake at Lightning Ridge and decided to return to the car. First, though, I had to have some fun at my pal Steve’s expense.
  I picked up a fallen limb, tapped him on the ankle from behind and shouted, “Watch out for that snake!”
  Walter Payton never pranced into an end zone with steps any higher.

  NEXT: THE PIANO BAR AND RACE DAY.