Roanoke Times Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc. DATE: WEDNESDAY, August 16, 1995 TAG: 9508160068 SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B1 EDITION: METRO SOURCE: DATELINE: MARTINSVILLE LENGTH: Long
Listen, buddy, I do the interviews around here. Actually, Skinner's question was a good one.
He probably noticed that my sweat-drenched face, scrunched inside my borrowed Simpson racing helmet, was as white as the walls at Martinsville Speedway.
I was sitting about two feet from Skinner. In a Chevrolet pickup truck. With the engine running. On pit road at the speedway.
``So, if this is a pickup, where's the shotgun?'' I asked Skinner.
Oh, it's me. That's where I was riding. Now, I've learned the first rule of NASCAR.
Don't be a wise guy when you're sitting next to someone with a wheel in his hands and 700 horsepower available.
Hey, I've driven pickup trucks before. And here's what I know about them:
Motor oil is motor oil.
``So, this is why they call this a NASCAR SuperTruck,'' I thought, as we roared toward turn 1.
Actually, it may have taken me two turns to think that much. The lengths you go for a column. Actually, I only went 1.578 miles for this one. That's three laps around the speedway.
I saw the .526-mile oval as never before, from a special passenger seat in a specially equipped Chevy C/K 1500. That's the model NASCAR allows in its 20-race SuperTruck series that comes to Martinsville for the Goody's 150 on Sept.23.
Skinner, a California native who once won a Late Model race at Martinsville, has driven his Richard Childress-owned No.3 - matching Dale Earnhardt's Winston Cup car - to victory in a series-leading six of the 13 races on the circuit that heads to Flemington, N.J., this weekend.
On Tuesday, he was giving free rides to the media. Naturally, I had to be first on the signup sheet. I couldn't wait. It couldn't be any more frightening than driving 55 miles from Roanoke to the track on U.S. 220, right?
This, however, was not a good time to mention the word ``deadline'' to me.
``So, how fast will we go on the straightaway?'' I asked Skinner.
``Only about 100,'' he said.
OK, that's about like a Nolan Ryan fastball, I told myself. That doesn't look so fast - unless you're right there.
And I was.
At least Skinner waited until the end of the ride to say these trucks can reach a speed of about 160.
Skinner has Earnhardt's mustache, but facially looks more like another Dale, Jarrett. At least I'm riding with a guy who knows what he's doing, right? He seems like a nice guy. He's won six times this year.
Oh, yeah, that means he's also going faster than the other guys.
I put on the helmet, then asked if it would be possible to get my glasses on inside the helmet. That was a stupid question.
You don't need glasses if you're making left turns with your eyes closed.
This may have been the first time anyone thought about getting the ``Jaws of Life'' to put someone in a car. As I was climbing in, I thought about the Joe Cocker song, ``He Came in Through the Bathroom Window.''
A bathroom would have looked good about then. In going through the window space, instead of doing it both legs together, I did it one at a time.
``Oh, like Earnhardt does it,'' one Skinner crewman said.
Gee, this is like baseball. They keep stats on that stuff, too?
Once I got into the seat, I was wearing more straps than Madonna usually dons in her videos. Skinner roared away from my fellow laughing media - they'd get their turn - and headed for turn 1.
I'd have crawled onto the floor, but seat belts save lives. And I wasn't sure whether the term ``white knuckles'' referred to me or how your hand would look if you reached out just inches and scraped the wall.
A couple of the press folks mentioned that when we we went through turns 3 and 4 on our second lap, the tires squealed. Or, perhaps it was me, screaming.
Hey, Skinner wasn't on the side toward the concrete. When the g-forces - or is that Gee! forces? - pulled me right, all I could hear was Eli Gold doing baseball play-by-play on the Motor Racing Network:
``There's Bogaczyk, bouncing off the wall ... ''
I couldn't have been in the truck more than five minutes, half of that getting strapped in. And just before I jumped out the same way I got in, Skinner said to one of his crewmen, ``Give that right side a couple of turns, will ya?''
Now, that's comforting.
When I jumped out after three laps at about an average of 85 mph, Mike Stevens of WDBJ asked me what it was like.
I was so coherent at the time, I thought Mike was Roy Stanley.
Listen, the only other time I've gone so fast, I got frequent-flyer miles.
What was it like? It was more bumpy in the turns than expected. You're going so fast - although it's slow to NASCAR because of Martinsville's short track - you don't have much time to worry.
I tried to imagine doing this solo, in a car or truck, playing dodge 'em with 40 other drivers and rides. I couldn't.
I left Skinner and the SuperTruck with a greater appreciation for what makes NASCAR's stars shine like their gleaming vehicles. And the next time people tell me race car - and truck - drivers aren't really athletes, I can steer them like Skinner did me.
As for me, I'm waiting for NASCAR to start running that minivan series.
Keywords:
AUTO RACING
by CNB