Strange Highways

Back in 1998, before anyone had come up with a term for writing an online journal, I'd written this column that I'm pretty sure no one ever read about a rather controversial finish to a NASCAR road race at Watkins Glen. And as I watched events transpire last night at Road America, I started thinking of that day's crazy twists and turns once again.

I really like NASCAR road racing. Most of my friends laugh at the thought of NASCAR drivers, paid to turn left for a living, trying to turn right. The fact is that most of the top drivers have attended one road-racing school or the other over the years, or teams have hired road-course specialists as driver coaches. But then you have to factor in that even a modern NASCAR-legal stock car with power steering and nimble handling is not a purpose-built sportscar, and that NASCAR drivers at slower speeds will get physical when necessary. For every smooth, slick display of driving at a road course, you get the '09 Montréal Nationwide Series demolition derby, er, race. It's still a far cry from the days when there were five guys contending for a win and thirty-five others just trying to get their points and get back to an oval.

And that's why NASCAR road racing is fun. Unlike a lot of the cookie-cutter ovals on the schedule these days, there are plenty of opportunities to pass. It unlocks a test of a driver's flexibility, and puts even more strategy into the pit crew's hands. And since handling, not aerodynamics, is the key to speed, the drivers can get a bit physical if needed, and a banged-up car won't spell the end of the day.

Since I've been watching NASCAR (and actually, since 1989, when Riverside International Raceway was closed up and turned into a shopping mall), NASCAR's top series has raced at only two road courses, the twisty Infineon (Sears Point) Raceway in California and the legendary Watkins Glen International nestled in the Finger Lakes of New York. The Nationwide Series has had a little more variety. For years the Busch Series held their lone road-course event at Watkins Glen, until the track was replaced by a second Daytona race in 2002. The series had no road course dates until 2005, when the schedule boasted companion event to August's Cup race at The Glen and a race at Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez in Mexico City. In 2007, a third road race was added at Montréal, Québec's famed Circuit Gilles Villeneuve. Mexico City would not return for the 2008 Nationwide Series schedule, but Montréal was very well received in '07 and has been on the schedule ever since.

At the end of the 2009 season, ownership and funding had left the future of the Milwaukee Mile in doubt, and to keep a race in the Wisconsin area, a race was scheduled for 2010 at the nearby Road America facility in Elkhart Lake, WI. Road America is the longest road course on the NASCAR schedules, with each circuit measuring about four miles. The 2010 race at Road America was successful enough to encourage a return in 2011. Adding to the drama was the fact that, as with the year before, the Sprint Cup teams were racing at Infineon the same weekend. With Cup regulars unable to compete for the Nationwide championship, most elected to stay in Sonoma for the weekend, leaving their seats open for plenty of road-course specialists to try their hand at NASCAR racing.

Road-course specialists, often referred to as "ringers" (though not necessarily in a pejorative way), have a long and storied history of involvement in NASCAR. A team not chasing the driver's championship might opt, at a road race, to put a driver behind the wheel who has a career of running road courses. On paper, it makes a lot of sense. In practice, it doesn't always work out so well. A stock car has a much different feel from, well, just about anything designed for road-course racing. And the teams that aren't chasing the driver's championship are usually not exactly the top teams. Of the six road-racing specialists trying to qualify for the Save Mart 350 at Sonoma today, only one, Boris Said, had a car that resembled anything competitive. (I'm not counting drivers like Robby Gordon or Juan Montoya who, though they are road-course specialists, are now full-time NASCAR drivers.) In the Nationwide Series, this is a bit less true; especially with the usual Cup double-dippers opting to race solely at Infineon Raceway, this meant their top-notch cars were in need of drivers for the weekend. Penske Racing tapped Jacques Villeneuve for the #22, Kevin Harvick put Max Papis in the #33, Ron Fellows took the wheel of the JR Motorsports #7, and Michael McDowell (an ARCA winner and former NW/Cup regular, but by way of the Star Mazda Series) took over for Kyle Busch in the #18 Toyota. Carl Edwards was planning to join McDowell at Road America, but after fellow Roush driver Billy Johnson practiced Edwards' car on Friday, Roush and Edwards elected to focus on Sonoma and keep Johnson in the #60 all weekend.

The ringers showed their hand in qualifying, with McDowell, Fellows, Papis, Villeneuve and Johnson all qualifying in the top five. And as the race started, as fans, we were treated to a display of why these guys were picked to race such fast cars. McDowell set sail in the #18, while behind him, Max Papis and Jacques Villeneuve raced aggressively for second and third. Ron Fellows alternated between second and fourth, sometimes in front of the dueling Canadian and Italian, sometimes behind them waiting for both of them to slip. The blocks, the passes, the precision and sometimes the patience, and with Villeneuve particularly the aggression, made for a great early display of racing as the ringers left the series regulars in the dust.

The catch with ringers, of course, is that they're still subject to the same NASCAR penalties as any other driver, and particularly susceptible when they are unaware of a penalty in the first place. Early on, Andrew Ranger (another Quebeçois driving for New England-based NDS Motorsports) was caught speeding on pit road, impeding his progress toward the front. Billy Johnson had troubles on pit road and lost track position under caution, then blew an engine later in the day.

Even the frontrunners were bitten. First, Max Papis was black-flagged for using too many pit stalls to merge into his own. I could see the penalty on a busy pit road, but on an empty pit road, it seemed unwarranted. I was a bit reluctant to say that he even used as many pit stalls as the broadcast team alleged. Papis was bumped to the back of the field for his transgression on the restart.

And on an ensuing restart, Jacques Villeneuve cut down behind the leader crossing the start-finish line, drawing a penalty for "changing lanes before the start-finish line." David Ragan received a penalty for the same action at Daytona, trying to push Trevor Bayne to victory, and Johnny Sauter was black-flagged in the closing laps of the Truck race at Texas for a similar violation. It's one thing to me if a driver were blocking, but on the restart the front two cars were several car-lengths in front of the rest of the field. Ultimately, it meant Villeneuve was back in the field for a penalty, and Ron Fellows was alone out front.

Papis and Villeneuve would eventually overcome their penalties. Villeneuve's championship-caliber pit crew got him back out quickly in the next sequence of pit stops. Max Papis' KHI team went with a strategic gamble, leaving the old tires on the car and topping off fuel to save time. Ultimately, Papis and Villeneuve emerged on the track together, staging another aggressive duel as they carved through slower cars trying to work on fuel strategy. While Papis and Villeneuve battled, Michael McDowell chased down his teammate Brian Scott, who at one point led McDowell by ten seconds while trying to conserve fuel. McDowell carved six seconds from that lead in one lap, then passed Scott the next lap to take the lead with seven laps to go. Ron Fellows was still a way back, with Papis and Villeneuve seeking redemption behind him.

And then Doug Harrington, another road-course ringer in slightly less-capable equipment, went off course in the Kink, leaving debris and sponsor banners strewn across the backstretch with two laps to go.

On the restart, McDowell and Fellows sat on the front row, with Brian Scott and Max Papis behind them. Villeneuve restarted fifth. As the teams came down the frontstretch, Villeneuve pulled out to his right, using the apron of the pit road exit to stage a pass on Brian Scott. The problem is that the pit lane exit merges about where Villeneuve pulled out to pass. Villeneuve hit the grass, then merged back into traffic. It was an Ayrton Senna sort of move; Villeneuve was committed to his pass, and it was up to everyone else if they were going to crash or not.

It wasn't up to them after all. Villeneuve clipped Brian Scott, and Scott's spinning car nudged Max Papis off the track. Papis spun nose-first into the outside wall, his yellow Chevrolet coming to a stop in the gravel pit outside of turn one. "Mad Max" was understandably upset; "I told you the 22 [Villeneuve] was going to do something stupid," he told his crew over the radio. "Great move, Jacques." Both Scott and Papis were dragged out of the gravel pit, and Papis angrily drove his battered car to pit road, where the team tore away the front end sheet metal and sent him on his way a couple laps down.

The second restart pitted McDowell's fast Toyota against Fellows' blue Chevrolet again. In third and fourth place were Turner Motorsports teammates Justin Allgaier and Reed Sorenson, both of whom had run consistently in the top ten, but never threatened the ringers for the win. Neither would be likely to replicate Villeneuve's charge. And then, on the restart, Justin Allgaier got a run into the first turn, passing Ron Fellows for second. McDowell held the lead through the following turns, even as Justin Allgaier closed in on McDowell's bumper.

And that's where the next road-course specialist fell apart.

McDowell blocked Allgaier's sudden charge through turn four, but skated to the outside as they exited the corner. Allgaier cleanly ducked inside and passed McDowell for the lead. McDowell fell back to second, then in the next corner, lost control and skidded to a stop in the grass. The caution flew as cars continued to collide in turns five and six, with Steve Wallace and Eric McClure coming to a stop in the turn and Wallace inexplicably getting out of his car to inspect the damage as cars raced through the mess.

What happened to McDowell? McDowell, of the successful seasons in the Star Mazda Championship and now seated in the best car in the Nationwide Series garage area? It looked as if McDowell had simply overdriven his car in the hopes of keeping the lead. It was the kind of reaction I would expect if McDowell had Jacques Villeneuve breathing down his back. But Justin Allgaier? Justin Allgaier isn't the sort of driver known for intimidation. In another few turns, McDowell would have had the lead back. Instead, he was now eighteenth with minor damage to his Toyota. (Michael would later tweet that he hit fluid on the track through the turns, fluid that may have come from Max Papis' ailing car.)

So now, Justin Allgaier held the lead with one restart left. Justin was about the last driver I expected to see in the lead this late in the going. In the interest of full disclosure, I've been a fan of Justin since he went full-time in ARCA, making me a bit biased on how I wanted this to turn out. But I can even acknowledge that Justin's not known for his road-racing prowess. In his previous five road races in the Nationwide Series, he finished seventeenth at Watkins Glen in '09 and ninth at Montréal in '10, with his other three finishes (two of those, admittedly, due to car failure) outside the top thirty. He does have an ARCA victory at New Jersey Motorsports Park in 2008, but that was a rain-shortened race won on strategy. Either way, I was just hoping for a good points day. Now, here he was leading with two laps to go.

On that restart, Justin looked like he had the field covered if he had enough fuel to make it to the end. Reed Sorenson was holding off Ron Fellows, but neither was able to close in on Allgaier. In fact, when some cars got together and sent Aric Almirola into the gravel trap in turn five, it looked like Justin had it for sure. Almirola was going nowhere fast, so all they had to do was throw the caution and Allgaier could limp on fumes to the finish. But the caution never came. Justin came around turn fourteen, took the white flag, but no caution. Turn one, no caution. Turn two, no caution. Almirola was still sitting in the gravel pit as Allgaier came up the uphill straightaway...and then the caution came out. Over half a lap to go.

And entering turn five, Allgaier's car wouldn't fire. Out of fuel, as...Ron Fellows passed him for the lead?

When the yellow flag came out, Allgaier slowed immediately to caution-flag pace, to stretch his fuel. Reed Sorenson, in second, did the same. But Ron Fellows stayed in the gas and passed Sorenson for second under caution. The video replays showed the corner worker waving the yellow before Fellows completed the pass. When the field came up on Allgaier's stalled car, Fellows came around at speed, passing Allgaier and pulling away from the field and up to the pace car, a good distance ahead. At first, the assumption was that Sorenson, too, had run out of fuel. In fact, he was running, and pulled alongside Fellows when the field finally did reach the pace car, showing his dissatisfaction.

The field crossed the finish line behind the pace car, with Reed Sorenson alongside Ron Fellows, both drivers waving in victory. The broadcast team said that NASCAR had flagged Fellows the race winner, and cut to Jennifer Jo Cobb pushing Justin Allgaier's car back to the pits. Then, the cameras cut back to Sorenson, who was doing donuts on the frontstretch; NASCAR had reversed their decision, and determined that Sorenson was indeed the race winner. It was the third victory for Turner Motorsports in 2011, and in an interesting twist of fortune and fate, in each victory, the winning car (Mark Martin in the #32 at Las Vegas, Allgaier at Chicagoland, and now Sorenson) had led only one lap all day.

Depending on who you cheer for, that last two-lap stretch was one that ranged from strange to downright absurd. As a racing fan, I knew that withholding that last yellow flag was meant to give the fans the most racing they could safely give them, rather than throwing an early yellow and locking the field in for one full pace lap. As a Justin Allgaier fan, I remembered all those cautions thrown over the years for spins or off-course excursions that would prove to be inconsequential, and wondered why they couldn't have thrown the yellow flag as soon as it was evident that the #88 was stuck in the sand trap (in other words, as soon as he got into the sand trap).

And what of Fellows? I like Ron Fellows as a long-time NASCAR road-course specialist, a guy who has been working with General Motors as long as I can remember. But I'm still not sure what he was thinking, passing Reed Sorenson under yellow. I have to assume he thought that Reed was out of fuel. I don't feel like Ron earned the victory in this one, and yet, I'd have rather seen him in victory lane than Reed, who I think of as a displaced Cup driver more than a Nationwide Series regular.

Allgaier was gracious on pit lane, calmly lamenting the bad turn of fortune but praising his team's performance all day. The same was not to be said for Fellows, who disappeared before a post-race interview could be conducted. Disappointingly, interviewers elected not to chase after Jacques Villeneuve, Brian Scott or Max Papis, the latter two of whom expressed their dissatisfaction with Villeneuve on pit road after the race was over.

Road courses are a bit of a wildcard on the NASCAR schedule, and Road America was all of that yesterday. Questionable calls on NASCAR's part, questionable actions on drivers' parts, a couple drivers no one would expect to contend and one of them coming away with the victory. We'll see if Sears Point can offer more of the same today.