ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Saturday, August 3, 1996 TAG: 9608050046
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B-5 EDITION: METRO
COLUMN: AUTO RACING
DATELINE: SPEEDWAY, IND.
SOURCE: BOB ZELLER
The whistles were finally getting to some of the NASCAR Winston Cup folks Friday at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
``I'd like to KILL that guy,'' one NASCAR public relations specialist said, nodding toward one of the yellow-shirted members of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Safety Patrol.
This particular yellow shirt seemed to use his whistle as a breathing device. Almost every breath that came out of his lungs managed to make some sort of sound through his whistle, usually a loud one.
But there were plenty more yellow shirts with whistles, spaced apart about every 20 feet along the avenue under the famous ``Gasoline Alley'' sign.
And their whistles, which warned garage dwellers of oncoming race cars, were as shrill as the V-8 NASCAR engines were loud.
``If I never hear another whistle again, I'll be happy,'' said another team member in the garage.
The complaints were a good indication that on its third trip to the greatest race course in the world, the NASCAR Winston Cup series has made itself comfortably at home here.
The third running of the Brickyard 400 begins at 1:15 p.m. today, and some 300,000 people will pack the place. It will be the third straight sellout for NASCAR at the world's largest stadium.
``It's got to be one of the reasons why so many new race tracks are being built,'' said H.A. "Humpy'' Wheeler, president of Charlotte Motor Speedway. ``No one was surprised when they sold out the first race. But when they sold out the second year, it was a strong signal that this sport had gone a lot higher than anyone thought it would.''
Both NASCAR and Indy-car racing have their own idiosyncrasies, but the two organizations have been able to work out the conflicts.
The ever-present golf carts in Gasoline Alley during the Indy 500 have been banned for the Brickyard 400 at NASCAR's request. But NASCAR acceded to Indy's demand to put electronic timing and scoring transmitters in the stock cars. And, of course, the NASCAR folks will just have to put up with the whistle-blowing yellow shirts.
``When we had our first race here, there were some adjustments,'' NASCAR President Bill France said Friday. ``But it's worked out well.''
On the eve of their third race here, the drivers have found that the rather flat turns around this 2.5-mile oval, which have nine degrees of banking, do not make for the best racing.
Track position is extremely important because the best-handling car usually is the one in front. The teams have found that a stock car in traffic here often gets loose and harder to handle.
Still, that same characteristic allowed the great late-race duel between Ernie Irvan and eventual winner Jeff Gordon in the inaugural race. Neither could hold the lead for long because the car in second could make the leader loose enough to pass.
The major anomaly with the Brickyard 400 is that NASCAR's richest, best-attended and second-most-prestigious race is sandwiched in the busiest stretch of the year.
This year, there was no off weekend after Talladega, and as injured Dale Earnhardt can testify, there hardly was time to take a breath after the Alabama race before it was time to head to Indiana.
And next weekend, it will be another long road trip to upstate New York for the Bud at the Glen.
The Daytona 500 is preceded by an entire winter of buildup and 10 days of practice and qualifying. The Indy 500 is the climax of a month of activity here. But the Brickyard 400 is just another race in a stretch of 14 in a row.
``You try and enjoy it, but we won at Talladega and we could only enjoy that until Wednesday morning, when we had to leave to come here,'' said Ray Evernham, Jeff Gordon's crew chief.
``But this is probably about the only time they could do it,'' said Wheeler. ``It's not that long after the Indy 500, and no one understands that the quick turnaround is a very, very difficult thing to do.''
So the Brickyard 400 comes and goes as fast as any other regular race on the NASCAR schedule.
But when you walk into this place, and once again look at that long, long front straight, and the old double-decked grandstands, and you hear Tom Carnegie's voice on the public address system, you know this not any regular event, no matter how lost it seems in the schedule.
``This is what I grew up with in New Jersey,'' Evernham said. ``Back then, Winston Cup racing was not that big. But you read about this place, and you wondered. Just today I saw Duke Nalon in here. I'm waiting for Clark Gable to come walking by. It's a great place to be.''
LENGTH: Medium: 86 linesby CNB