Top Row Seat - Richmond
Dateline: 06/09/98On Saturday night under the lights Richmond International Raceway put on a short track shootout that was overflowing with controversy.
Incidents and Accidents
The first stirring of controversy came when Jeff Green, driving the #46 First Union car owned by Felix Sabates, was assisted into the outside wall by Ted Musgrave. Green obviously took exception to Ted's driving style and was headed down pit road when the NASCAR officials wisely caught up with him and turned him around before he had a chance to do anything "detrimental to the sport".
In the subsequent interview Jeff Green was clearly upset but I'm having a hard time swallowing his story. Time and time again Ted Musgrave has displayed his even temper and great respect for his fellow drivers. Personally, I'm a lot more likely to believe that Ted made an honest mistake and Green happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. I've never seen Musgrave do anything unsportsmanlike on or off the racetrack.
The next big incident was the Rusty-Gordon tangle. Quite simply, I've got to agree with Benny Parsons. The overhead replay pretty clearly shows that Rusty got just a little bit loose and had to chase the car up the track just a little. And when you're in a door-to-door battle in the closing laps of a short track race it does not take much of an error to cause an incident. Final call: Just honest racing.
For all you Gordon fans who would like to complain I'd like to refer you to the video tape from the spring Bristol race last year or to the last lap of the Southern 500. Gordon has gotten aggressive and called it racing, he can't get too upset when he ends up on the short end of a racing accident.
Finally. The Dale Jarrett - Terry Labonte incident does not really require much in the way of comment. Terry made an honest mistake and I believe that he truly felt bad for it. They were also racing hard for the win and Terry got down into the corner a little bit too hard.
Terry's quote from victory lane on TNN's RaceDay Sunday was "I hate it, but he'll get over it."
The Red Flag
I am so outraged at this rediculously random ruling by NASCAR that this topic called for it's own page. Click here to read the conclusion to my Richmond rant.
