"Finally a beautiful day. It was so hot today I was sweating like a Kennedy trying to get car insurance."
--Jay Leno

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Ginn Clubs back on the #14 for Darlington: Ginn Clubs & Resorts returns to the #14 MB2 Motorsports Chevy that Sterling Marlin drives at Darlington Raceway. Ginn was the sponsor on the car at Martinsville and is scheduled to be on the car as the primary sponsor for Daytona in July and Lowe's in October.(MB2Motorsports PR)

The Duke of Darlington


Once again it's race week in  Darlington, for decades my favorite place on NASCAR's big-time tour.

Yep, even more than the San Francisco area.  Or Phoenix.  Or Daytona Beach.

Why was often-dusty, relatively rural litle Darlington my No. 1?

A variety of reasons.

I loved Darlington because of the beauty of the stately old homes out on Cashua Ferry Road, their grounds awash in color as azaleas bloomed during spring race weeks.

I loved it because of the Raceway Grill, just off what originally was the track's fourth turn.  The little cafe was famous for its hamburger steaks, still sizzling in the platter when served.  Legendary driver/team owner Junior Johnson once declared, "I've eaten at fine restaurants all over the world, and I've never had a better meal than a Raceway Grill hamburger steak."

I loved Darlington because of the inevitable antics of high-spirited fans in the infield.

I loved it because the track, dating to 1950 and the oldest of NASCAR's superspeedways, was such a difficult test for most drivers.  David Pearson, Dale Earnhardt, Jeff Gordon, Cale Yarborough, Bobby Allison, Darrell Waltrip, Bill Elliott, Fireball Roberts and Harry Gant were the exceptions.  For others, the raceway nicknamed "The Lady In Black" because of her treachery, usually was equal to its motto, "The Track Too Tough To Tame."

And I loved Darlington because it was where long-time raceway official Red Tyler held court.

W.D. "Red" Tyler of nearby Florence, S.C., joined Darlington Raceway's board of directors in 1952.  He  became vice-president in 1968 and president early in '83, a post he held for seven years.

If there ever has been a more colorful track official, I haven't met him.

Just being around Red was fun, mainly because of his acerbic wit.  He invariably had funny things to say, and often it was on the risque side.

Some examples:

--Red loathed Clemson University.  He'd attended Presbyterian College, and back in the 1930s Clemson had beaten Red's school something like 77-0.  Red never forgave the Tigers.

So he always had a Clemson put-down.

Once, at a pre-race party in Darlington, Red, with his wife Margie at his side, beckoned me to their table.  "Tom, I just wanted to tell you that Margie caught me in bed with another woman last night and isn't even going to do anything about it!" he said.

I said I found that difficult to believe.

"Know why?" Red continued smugly.  "The other woman's husband went to Clemson!"

--While serving as Darlington Raceway's vice president Red often teased his colleague, Barney Wallace, the president, about the latter's widely-known, much-deserved reputation for being tight with the money.

As I walked toward the track's infield cafeteria one day Red yelled for me to join him in his motorhome parked nearby.

We chatted a bit and then Red said he wanted to prove a point about Wallace's parsimony.

Red radioed Wallace, who was in his office just outside the track.

"Bahney, Bahney," said Red in the deepest Southern drawl I've ever heard.  "The screen do' (door) over here at the cafeteria has a fairly big hole in it.  The flies are getting in there and practically carrying off the food.  You need to send a carpenter or someone over heah to re-screen that do'."

There was a long silence.

Finally, Wallace responded.  "Red," he said seriously, "let's wait and see what kind of crowd we have on race day before we take on that project."

Red rolled his eyes and both of us broke out in laughter.

--Red owned a very large houseboat that he based on the coast at Georgetown, S.C.  He enjoyed playing host to drivers and others in racing when they came to the area to fish.

Pearson, Buddy Baker, former-driver-turned-team owner Hoss Ellington and myself once were Red's guests during a major king mackerel fishing tournament in the Myrtle Beach area.

The ocean had been very rough during the event's first day.  Some participants experienced sea-sickness, and more of the same seemed in prospect as the forecast was for the waves to keep rolling high and hard.

We discussed what to do, pondering the use of Draminine, patches behind the ears, and so forth.

Red, who wasn't fishing in the tournament, scoffed.

"I have the perfect antidote for sea-sickness," he proclaimed grandly.

"For God's sake, please tell us what it is!" begged Ellington.

Red bellowed in delight and yelled, "Hug an oak tree!"

In other words, stay off the ocean.

--Fellow motorsports writer and pal Steve Waid  and I once were fishing with Red at the Winyah Bay jetties near Georgetown.

We were using fiddler crabs for bait and trying to catch sheepshead, which are tasty and scrappy fighters.

Waid, concededly not an angler, was having a difficult time getting fiddlers on his hook.

"Boy, it's simple," said Red.  "Just turn 'em over and tickle their bellies.  When they open their mouths to laugh, stick the hook in there."

Poor Steve spent the next hour trying that technique until I told him better.

At some point during Red's reign as track president I nicknamed him "The Duke Of Darlington."

He hated it--or at least made like he did--and thereafter he had a good-natured zinger awaiting me every time we happened to meet.

I got him back--and good--during one of the NASCAR fraternity's trips to New York for the post-season awards festivities.

Red and I were sharing a table with friends at Peacock Alley in the Waldorf-Astoria's lobby.  Three elegant, elderly ladies sat nearby.

As Red arose to go to a NASCAR meeting, one of the ladies commented on his drawl.

"My, what a charming accent," she said.  "I bet when you were a little boy Gen. Robert E. Lee was your hero."

I couldn't resist.

"Ma'am," I said.  "I've got news for you.  When Robert E. Lee was a little boy, Red Tyler was HIS hero"

There was a lot of laughter, and Tyler's face turned as red as his hair once was.

His one-liners aimed at me grew in intensisty and frequency.  I enjoyed every one of them.

Sadly, Red died suddently of a heart attack in March of 1994 at age 73 just days before a gleaming new grandstand, The Tyler Tower, was to be dedicated in his honor at Darlington Raceway.

That tower, and all other seats at the grand old track are sold out for Saturday night's Dodge Charger 500.  Hopefully, a good time will be had by all.

Ol' Red would like that.
For Burton, first impression at RCR didn’t last
Lou Bezjak


First impressions can be deceiving, at least in Jeff Burton’s case.

When Burton left Roush Racing to move over to Richard Childress Racing in the middle of the 2004 season, he wasn’t greeted with much optimism.

RCR was in the midst of a struggling season, which ended up with departure of Robby Gordon.

“My first day at work at Childress was interesting. I had three crew chiefs, two engineers in about a four-hour period come to me and say, ‘What the (heck) are you doing?’” Burton said during Preseason Thunder at Daytona. “They told me about all the bad stuff, and they won’t do this and they won’t do that.”

That was almost two years ago and a lot has changed in RCR since then. In the offseason alone, Childress revamped almost every area in the company from research and development to its engine shop.

The result?

RCR is a contender again with its drivers racing side-by-side with Hendrick and Roush, which have dominated the sport the last few years.

The team’s three cars are all in the top 15 in points, led by Kevin Harvick, who is in fifth place and emerging as a title contender.

Burton is in 11th and rookie Clint Bowyer is 15th.

If the results continue, RCR is likely to place one if not two cars in the Chase for the Championship. RCR is one of the few multi-car teams not to have a driver make the top 10 in the two years of the NASCAR’s new playoff system.

“Everybody has raised his hand and asked what I can do to help and to make the company better and I think we’re making major strides,” Burton said after Saturday’s race in Richmond. “But I’m not above anybody and I’m playing my part.”

Burton has played his role, albeit a little different one from he had his best years in the late 1990s. The Virginia native said it is taken him a while to get used the way things work especially in the shop.

He points out he was used to working with about 30 people at the shop. But these days, that number has swelled to about 350.

“I still want to help because I think I’m really good at that,” Burton said. “But now, I try to get a group together and say, ‘OK, how are we going to fix this,’ and try to help build the plan rather than me making the plan.

“That’s been my biggest adjustment.”

One area he hasn’t needed help in is ability to communicate with the media and sponsors. He has never been one to shy from interviews and his done a variety of TV work over the years.

This week, Burton will be a prerace co-host for Friday’s Diamond Hill Plywood on FX in addition to doing a journal about this weekend’s Darlington experience for the Morning News.

“I like to talk,” Burton said. “I enjoy having conversation and argument and agreement and disagreement and I don’t mind doing that in front of people.”

That part of his personality is starting rub off on his teammates — especially Harvick — who has been known for his volatile nature at times.”

“Jeff has helped a lot,” Harvick said last week at Richmond.

“He brings a very correct manner of how you’re supposed to handle things and a very professional manner of how you’re supposed to handle things with a sponsor, and how you’re supposed to handle things in the shop.”

But Harvick admits it might take a while before he can totally follow in Burton’s footsteps.

“I still can’t 100 percent do that,” Harvick said. “When you have that in front of you, and you can see how you should do things and handle things and what you should say and when you shouldn’t say something, I think it kind of bleeds over to everybody else.”

Driver, car appearances

Greg Biffle’s No. 16 Ford Fusion show car will be at the Bi-Lo, located at 508 Lamar Highway in Darlington today from 3-6 p.m. ... Roush Racing driver Carl Edwards is scheduled to sign autographs at the Office Depot merchandise hauler Saturday from 3:45-4:15 p.m. ... The No. 90 Busch Series car will be at Citi Financial on 215 W. Evans St. in Florence on Friday from noon-6 p.m. ... Clint Bowyer will be signing autographs at the Jack Daniel’s souvenir trailer Saturday from 1-1:45 p.m.

S.I. pols wave red flag at NASCAR proposal
BY MAUREEN SEABERG and FRANK LOMBARDI
DAILY NEWS WRITERS
 
Not so fast NASCAR!

All three Staten Island Council members banded yesterday against a plan to build a NASCAR track on a former oil tank farm near the Goethals Bridge.

Their united front could signal a flag of doom for the project, which would require City Council approval. Generally, the rest of the Council heeds the wishes of the affected borough's delegation.

Democrat Michael McMahon announced yesterday that he wouldn't vote for the track and called it "finished."

His two Republican colleagues - James Oddo and Andrew Lanza - also oppose the project.

Meanwhile, Council Speaker Christine Quinn (D-Manhattan) sent Mayor Bloomberg a letter urging him to take a closer look at the controversial NASCAR track proposal.

But the project's lobbyist, Guy Molinari, insisted the $500 million plan to build a NASCAR track and a shopping plaza will move forward.

"We want to take our case to the people," said Molinari, Staten Island's Republican kingmaker during long stints as borough president and a congressman.

The site is owned by the International Speedway Corp. with NASCAR and the Related Cos., a development firm headed by Stephen Ross, a friend and former business partner of Deputy Mayor Daniel Doctoroff, who oversees economic development for Bloomberg.

The mayor acknowledged the NASCAR proposal "is obviously a controversial issue on Staten Island," and that it would have serious traffic impact, even if the track is to be used only three weekends a year.

"We should look honestly at what the opportunities and what the costs are of every economic development project," Bloomberg said. "And that's what we've got to focus on."  

NASCAR fans will see races in new ways
By Dustin Long
Staff Writer

NASCAR fans next season will see Nextel Cup races in ways they never have before: online, on several TV channels at once -- even cell phones.

As ESPN returns to racing after a five-year absence, it plans to show races on multiple broadcast channels and on the Internet. It will make expanded race information available on its own Web sites and nascar.com, the sport's Web site that's owned by Time Warner.

MobileESPN, the sports network's new cell-phone package, might get in on the act as well.

"We're kind of in a different age," says David Berson, senior vice president, program planning and development for ESPN and ABC Sports. "People consume things in many different ways. What we want to do is make sure we're using all of our platforms to serve the fan."

The expanded coverage is part of a broadcast evolution for NASCAR, whose top series appeared on six different networks as recently as five years ago. It wasn't until 2001, the first year of its current television deal, that the Cup series had most of its races on network television.

A new eight-year TV contract that begins next year will give NASCAR fans the chance to watch a race in ways beyond the standard broadcast. Rejoining NASCAR is ABC, better known as the home of the Indianapolis 500 and open-wheel racing that once showed some NASCAR events on its "Wide World of Sports'' program. The new deal also reunites fans with ESPN, which helped the sport grow in the 1980s and '90s.

Fans this time will see a different ESPN, which provided glimpses in March of what some upcoming NASCAR broadcasts could be like.

The network showed the Duke-North Carolina men's basketball game on ESPN and ESPN2, its main cable channels, and ESPNU, a new channel now available in the Triad on satellite. Each channel covered the game differently.

Berson said the game was ESPN's most viewed regular-season college basketball game.

Last month, the network broadcast the opening game of the Chicago-Miami NBA playoff series on ESPN, ESPN2 and ESPN Deportes, its Spanish language network. ESPN also showed the game online. During the game, the network's cell phone, Mobile ESPN, provided highlights, live polls and statistics, similar to some services NASCAR fans can get on their Sprint Nextel phones. ESPNews and ESPNRadio aired updates throughout the event.

Berson said the network plans to broadcast some NASCAR events next season in that blanket-coverage style. One possibility is the Daytona Busch race because the event marks ESPN's return to the sport. Another is the Mexico City Busch race. Berson also said the network is considering all-inclusive coverage for the summer and fall Cup races at Indianapolis, Bristol, Richmond and Homestead, the season finale.

Berson said it's unlikely ESPN will provide as extensive coverage for all 10 chase races next year because the network has other major sports -- college football and Major League Baseball -- in the fall.

Rick Miner, senior vice president of programming and production for Speed Channel, says that ESPN's multi-channel broadcasts are "definitely the future of all event programming. What do you do to attract that multi-tasking person to your live coverage? I think the only answer is the kind of thing ESPN is experimenting with now."

ESPN might not be alone. Fox Sports has not yet revealed any changes to its race coverage. But Fox Sports' parent company also owns SPEED and DirecTV, two media properties that could create extra viewing choices for fans.

DirecTV, for instance, could add a pay-per-view service similar to its NFL Sunday Ticket package. This SuperFan package lets NFL fans can watch as many as eight games on the same screen. A similar racing package could provide a channel that shows multiple in-car camera shots during a race.

NASCAR fans could get their first glimpse of the changes in February during Speedweeks, the events that lead up to the season-opening Daytona 500.

"I am really looking forward to Speedweeks because that's when you've got Fox kicking off their true ownership of the Daytona 500," says Dick Glover, NASCAR's vice president for broadcasting and new media. "You've got SPEED with all their upgraded programming. You've got ESPN returning. They're all anxious to show what they got, so I think that is going to be a really exciting time."

Marcis speeds into retirement
By GODWIN KELLY
Motorsports Editor


DAYTONA BEACH -- Dave Marcis turned 65 this year and still has the spring of a rookie.

Marcis, who made his 883rd and final Nextel Cup Series start in the 2002 Daytona 500, reports retirement is almost as taxing as being the owner of an independent stock-car team.

The Marcis Empire includes a hotel/bar/restaurant complex in Rib Lake, Wis., and a street rod shop in Arden, N.C. He also hunts, goes fishing and moonlights as an International Race of Champions test driver, a job he has held for two decades.

Marcis was in town Tuesday and Wednesday as IROC preps for Round 3 on June 29 over Daytona International Speedway's 3.56-mile road course.

His IROC duties have helped eased the transition from driver to businessman.

"I think this helps quite a bit," he said in the Speedway garage area during a break in IROC testing. "On several occasions I've told my wife Helen I think I need to go run a Nextel Cup race again at Talladega, but she don't agree.


"I was in it for 35 years and I do miss the driving part. I don't miss all the work at the shop and activities involved with getting ready to go to the racetrack, but I sure miss the driving part of it."

Marcis, who had five career victories, has no connections or affiliations with any NASCAR team, so he is free to speak his mind on any racing subject. From the outside looking in, he doesn't like all he sees these days.

"I see a lot of politics and money," he said. "I don't think it's racing like it used to be. I don't watch that many of them as they're happening. The wife tapes them for me and I run through them.

"I stay so busy I don't have the time to spend four hours in front of the television. It's so commercialized, there are so many ads, you don't get to watch much racing any how. It's all ads, I lose my interest in it that way."

Marcis is also troubled over the lack of driver interaction he sees at the racetrack these days. He said today's drivers are disconnected from each other, which leads to needless confrontation, and the race fans.

"It's changed drastically since I was in it," he said. "The drivers were more involved in it in my era, as far as talking to each other, sharing ideas, doing things together up and down the road, traveling together."

Marcis shuttles between his businesses in Wisconsin and North Carolina. His Camp 28 is a thriving entertainment center while his old NASCAR shop has been converted into mini street rod factory.

He takes delivery of genuine Nextel Cup chassis from Laughlin Racing then builds a monster car that can be licensed for the street. The next car out of his shop will be packing one of his old racing V-8 engines.

"This is pretty unique situation," Marcis said. "It's a neat car. You could drive this to a competition, make adjustments to sway bars, shocks and things like that. After you kicked everybody's butt, you can switch it back to a street rod and drive it home."

"It's going quite well," he added of his speed business. "I'm a little behind schedule on some of our orders because I've been doing too much hunting and fishing. We have several orders on cars and we've done other mechanical work on street rods for people."

As a full-time independent racer, Marcis had to stretch every resource. He was always short of one vital commodity -- time.

He still stretches the clock, but these days, it's more on his terms, such as a hunting trip to Africa at the end of this month.

"The business I've got keeps me busy," he said. "I haven't sat down for a minute. I enjoy staying busy. I would probably miss racing more if I was just sitting around, so I don't sit around."