Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, June 18, 1995 TAG: 9506210034
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: E-9 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: BROOKLYN, MICH. LENGTH: Medium
How does a car grow? How could Jeff Gordon's car grow a quarter-inch in height, more or less, in the five minutes between the time it failed post-qualifying inspection and the time it passed here Friday.
Gordon had absolutely dusted the field in qualifying, winning his seventh pole of 1995 by more than three-tenths of a second, which is a whopping amount at any Winston Cup track. His speed was 186.611 mph - a record by more than 5 mph.
Then, his car went through post-qualifying inspection and, whoops, the roof was too low. Five minutes later, when the car was allowed to go through again, the Chevrolet Monte Carlo apparently had grown to the proper height.
But at the end of a long, hot day of pavement pounding, there seemed to be answers to everything, pro and con, and the verdict in this reporter's court was a hung jury, even while some elements of the incident seemed awfully fishy.
The argument offered by NASCAR Winston Cup director Gary Nelson and Gordon's crew chief, Ray Evernham, was that when the media crowded around Gordon to interview him immediately after his qualifying run, a number of people, including Gordon, leaned on the car, pushing it lower than the height at which it qualified.
``Had the car gone through inspection directly off the track, it wouldn't have been any problem,'' said Evernham, who has been fighting one brush fire after another at the top of the Winston Cup series.
Immediately after the interviews, Gordon's team pushed the car about 60 yards to the inspection bay. They got in line behind Ricky Rudd's car, went over the scales, then went under the height bar, where red showed on the scale.
To espouse the theory put forth by NASCAR and Evernham, one must believe the car was slowly rising to its proper height, millimeter by millimeter, for about five minutes after the interview session ended.
Some crew chiefs and team members scoffed at this notion. But others said it was not out of the realm of possibility because of the shock absorbers that are on Winston Cup cars.
Several people who witnessed Gordon's car make its second pass under the height bar said team members were holding the car at the top of the wheel wells as they rolled it back into the inspection station and that it appeared they were lifting it as they rolled it.
This is a common trick used by many teams to give the car a little extra boost seconds before it takes the height test.
But Evernham said that was not the case.
``There were probably three NASCAR inspectors in the inspection bay, and Gary Nelson watched us,'' he said.
Said Nelson: ``I was watching for that, and it didn't happen.''
And a rival crew chief, Robin Pemberton, said he was watching the inspection and no one on Gordon's team was lifting the car as it was rolled.
Still, NASCAR has disallowed the qualifying times of several cars because they were too low. Those cars measured low and that was that. Why was Gordon's team given two passes under the height bar?
Nelson said a second try was justified ``given the circumstances of the question of people leaning on the car.''
So it was a messy little issue. But in truth , none of Gordon's competitors was too upset about it Saturday.
Rudd, whose team had witnessed the incident, complained long and hard to Nelson on Friday, but decided he had nothing to gain Saturday.
Car owner Jack Roush said it was unusual to give a car a second chance under the height bar, but his bottom line was: ``I don't care. It doesn't matter. The issue is the aerodynamic and drag disparity between the Fords and Chevrolets.''
Junior Johnson said: ``If he went through the first time and he was wrong, then he's wrong. There ain't no halfway. But they've [NASCAR] got an answer for their screw-ups. Always.''
But truth be told, Johnson wasn't wrapped up in the issue, and it never is hard to coax criticism of NASCAR from him.
And as one crewman said: ``I think everybody is just too tired to worry about it.''
by CNB