In the Blink of an Eye (2 page)

CHAPTER 4
GAS RIGHT

M
ikey got an upgrade. I went from an old Greyhound bus to a sporty new 442. Cool Bro and I were off to the races, rolling toward Nashville, Tennessee. I was excited. And as any young boy would have, I suppose, I wanted to impress Bobby right away with my extensive racing knowledge.

“I got this, Bob,” I told him. “I know I can do it. I know what lines to take in the corners. I know how to swing out next to the wall on the straights. And then, when I win, I have to thank my sponsors in Victory Lane, just like Darrell does.”

“Thank you, God, Goody’s, and Goodyear,” Darrell liked to say.

Then Bobby asked me something I hadn’t thought of. “Do you know which side the gas pedal is on and which side’s the brake?”

“Ah, yes, sir,” I answered. “Well, no. Not exactly.”

Thinking, thinking, thinking . . .

“I think right. But I get confused.” I guess I was more like a virtual race-car driver. I’d never actually done it before. But I sure had seen it done plenty of times.

“Little brother, that ain’t nothing like the real thing,” Bobby said. He knew I needed real experience.

Bobby’s shop was located just out of Nashville in Franklin, Tennessee. When we got there and checked out his kart, Bobby began to talk me through everything I had to know the next day when I got to the track. Even the basics were intimidating to me though. I was like a sponge, trying to soak up everything.

“Gas on right, brake on left,” Bobby said. And I kept repeating that quietly to myself. “What if I forget that little detail?” I thought.

And things got even more complicated from there. I needed to know how to tune the engine on the track. What to listen for. What to do in order to make sure the engine was running right.

When I went to bed that night, I was so scared I couldn’t sleep.

The next day was my big day, what I’d been dreaming of. I was totally excited to be there. But mostly scared. What if I wasn’t good at this? There was no way to know if I would be. You can’t tell by looking at a kid if he can drive or not. What if I messed something up? What if I wrecked? That would surely make Bobby mad. I knew it would. And that engine-tuning thing. I had to get that right. Bobby said if I didn’t do it correctly, I would melt his engine down. That, I was sure, would be career-ending. Really? My career was ending? It hadn’t even begun!

I was so worried about what I was getting ready to do, I was already thrown by even the simplest details, like what side the gas pedal was on. But I had a plan. I found a big, fat pen and I put a large G on my right tennis shoe and a B on my left.

Just in case.

When I woke up Sunday morning I laced up my marked sneakers, and off to the track we went. It was located in Smyrna, about twenty miles from Bobby’s house. When I got there and checked out the track, it looked like it had about six turns. Bobby said I was going to race in the rookie junior class. When it was time to practice, I put on a leather jacket and a helmet that Bobby gave me and I hopped on his kart. Even with my brother coaching me, telling me everything to do, I was still really nervous about the thought of pulling onto the track for the first time. But as soon as I did, the nervousness went away, and my focus was directed on the Smyrna Speedway. Right off, I felt comfortable. It felt natural to me. I was doing what I’d seen DW do a zillion times. It was like I got it. And my first laps? They weren’t great laps, but they were pretty good, I guess.

After practice, Bobby patted me on the back and said, “Good job, Little Bro.”

“Really? You think I did good?” I asked him.

“You did great. I’m proud of you.”

I was off to a promising start.

My brother was proud of me. Not the one I had put up on a pedestal my whole life. The other brother. The one who was there when I had two strikes against me and I was trying to figure out how I was going to go race. He gave me the chance, and I made him proud. I was feeling really good about this day.

When it was time for my race, I was ready. There were just four of us rookie kids. I think my kart was probably better than theirs. And I won. By a lot.

When I pulled in, they handed me the checkered flag and told me to take a victory lap. I thought to myself: “Yes! I love this. And I’m good at it. I knew I’d love it. I wasn’t so sure I’d be good at it. But I was. I won.” I couldn’t believe it. This had to be as good as it got.

The first person I saw after the race was Bobby, and he had a huge smile on his face. He was a team owner, mechanic, and driver-coach, but mostly I could tell he was a proud big brother. The next person I saw was the trophy queen, holding my winning prize. Bobby told me I had to kiss her to get my trophy.

What? That scared me more than the thought of racing had that day.

Luckily for me, the queen and I decided we would just shake hands and call it even. That afternoon, on the way back to meet my bus, Bobby and I talked nonstop. Or maybe I talked nonstop and Bobby just listened. But I know one thing he said for sure. He said that by the end of my race, the lap times I was running were comparable to his. Really? I had watched Bobby win races before. Being as fast as him meant a lot to me. He may have just been saying that to be nice, I don’t know. But it sure was a good thing to hear.

It was getting close to dark when we drove up to the bus station. Bobby hugged me and said ’bye. With my suitcase in one hand and my trophy in the other, I boarded my Greyhound back to Owensboro.

The bus was crowded. I took a seat by a sweet-looking elderly lady. When I sat down, I noticed she was staring at my trophy.

“My first one,” I said, sounding all full of myself, I’m sure.

She smiled and then quickly turned more serious. What’s she thinking? I wondered.

I didn’t have to wonder long.

She said something I have never forgotten in all the years since then. “Son,” she told me, “rejoice in the moment. Enjoy your victory.” She then grabbed my hand and looked straight into my eyes and said, “Don’t take what you’ve accomplished for granted. Ever.”

I guess she could tell by the way I said “my first one” that I thought there would be many, many more. She wanted me to appreciate any and all of my victories, however few or many that turned out to be.

Because of the life lesson that sweet lady taught me that night, I did just that. I hugged each trophy and enjoyed each win like there wouldn’t be another. Fortunately, thanks to his Bobby and his fast go-kart, I was hugging about one a week that summer.

When that summer began,
I was definitely a momma’s boy because of all the time I spent with her. But some things were beginning to happen to me. I was doing manly stuff, growing closer to my brother and my father. I was already close to my sisters because they had just about raised me. Now, Bobby was making time for me too. That helped me grow up a lot.

PART 2:
DRIVING

CHAPTER 7
CUP DEBUT

R
ichard Petty sent me to Humpy Wheeler, who sent me to Dick Bahre. Within a few days of moving in with Richard, I had a ride in the World 600.

If it weren’t for the King, I might still be sitting around trying to follow my lame plan. Instead, I was going to be driving Dick Bahre’s 1985 Chevrolet Monte Carlo with #23 on the side. It was the Memorial Day weekend NASCAR race at the Charlotte Motor Speedway.

My experience was admittedly minimal—okay, almost none—in a car like this one. This baby was big. It had a 358-cubic-inch V8 engine in it. It had maybe double the horsepower of anything I had ever driven anywhere.

The mini-modifieds I’d raced back in Kentucky? They had little four-bangers in them. The Dash Series cars? Same thing. Small motor, no power. This was going to be a major step up for me. I’d be sitting in one of the most powerful race cars in the world, a NASCAR Winston Cup stock car. This was a man’s machine, and it felt like one too. I’m six-foot-five. Squeezing into those mini-modifieds and Dash cars was a pain in the neck. Literally. I had to tilt my head to the side to see through the windshield. But in that Cup car, I had plenty of room. Heck, Wilt Chamberlain would have had plenty of room.

And oh, by the way, when I was sitting in that baby with all that room, looking out that windshield so clearly—I was going to be looking at Richard Petty, David Pearson, and Darrell Waltrip all racing on the same track with me. That was a little hard to comprehend. Barely a decade earlier, I was in the backseat of Mom and Dad’s Chevy heading south to watch these guys, dreaming of being one of them one day. That day was here. I was going to be racing with the greats in the World 600.

If I could accomplish one thing.

It was kind of a big thing.

I needed to qualify for the race.

Practice was on Wednesday. To say I was intimidated would be like saying the
Titanic
sprung a small leak. Think pulling onto the track that first time ever in Bobby’s go-kart was scary? This was way worse. No one was watching then.

If I’d screwed up on Bobby’s go-kart, Bobby would have been mad. If I went out now and messed up and I took Richard Petty or Darrell Waltrip with me? The whole NASCAR world would be mad.

But just like that day in Smyrna, Tennessee, when I hit the track, I wasn’t nervous anymore. I was just focused. When I got on the back straightaway and put my right foot on the floorboard, the action picked up considerably. Suddenly I felt like I was in a wrestling match with somebody way bigger than me—maybe a couple of people. I felt like I’d driven the cars I’d raced prior to this one. But this car, with all its power and all its girth—mostly, I was along for the ride. That sucker had a mind of its own. As I wrestled that car around the track, it didn’t take but a lap or two for me to realize how much I had to learn.

I really felt like a rookie. I hadn’t experienced anything like this. By the time most guys make their Cup debut, they’ve been racing big, powerful cars like this one on dirt tracks and short tracks all over the South. I was mad at that stupid Dash car now. I felt like such a wimp. That wasn’t racing. Those cars were easy to drive. I thought I was somebody, winning those races and that championship. But that hadn’t done anything to prepare me for the path the King had put me on.

Heck, Dale Earnhardt won a race in his rookie year. I’d be lucky to qualify.

So I had to learn it quickly. Qualifying was just a couple of hours away. I thought I was a pretty good driver, but I was beginning to rethink that. I was having a hard time driving this car. It was driving me—crazy.

By the time practice had ended, my crew told me I’d run some pretty good lap times. With my lack of experience and trying to understand this car, I was having trouble putting consistent laps together. But when I did it right, I was pretty fast. First-round qualifying for the 600 would lock in the first fifteen positions. The 600 was the only race during the season where qualifying consisted of four laps. They took all four of your laps and averaged them together. Whoever had the fastest four-lap average won the pole.

Luckily, there was a second round of qualifying. Because round one didn’t go so well for me.

The inconsistency I’d struggled with in practice was the issue again. My four-lap average wasn’t good because my second two laps were really slow.

In second-round qualifying the next day, it was just straight up your fastest lap—one lap to get in the race. I felt confident about being able to run one lap fast enough to make the World 600 field. And I did. My speed locked me into twenty-fourth position. Heck, I even beat Richard Petty in my first Cup attempt!

Richard came by and told me, “You done good there”—or something like that. Whatever it was, it made me smile. Then he said: “Make sure you get out of my way when they throw the green flag Sunday.”

He walked off. I wondered if he was kidding or he was serious.

Was he being Richard Petty, my landlord? Telling me if I liked where I lived, I’d get out of his way? Or was he being Richard Petty, the racer, who didn’t want this rookie holding him up?

Whichever way it was, I was going to get out of the King’s way. He was the one who came up with this whole idea. I couldn’t believe that it was just a couple of weeks earlier I was lying on his couch with no idea what was coming next.

Now the King had just congratulated me for, of all things, out-qualifying him. But he also left me with a little dose of reality, reminding me to get the hell out of his way.

That’s how things were going for me, steady progress at breakneck speed. And here I was, qualified for my first NASCAR Winston Cup race.

But for the very first time, I wasn’t thinking about winning. This Cup car had made me second-guess what I’d been doing career-wise up to this point.

It was a different breed, this hotrod. I wasn’t going to win at Charlotte. But hopefully I’d catch on quick so I could continue my winning ways.

I was trying to build myself back up. I must be pretty good, I thought. This is the first time I tried to qualify, and I did it.

But I didn’t like the way that big ol’ car felt at all. I wished I’d learned to drive one of these when nobody was looking—instead of right on NASCAR’s center stage. A little late to be worrying about that now.

Another thing that had never dawned on me: They didn’t call this race the World 600 just because they thought it sounded catchy. That 600 meant something—600 miles, my first race in NASCAR and the longest race of the year.

That’s about how far it was from Owensboro to Daytona. That was a scary thought. And this time, I wouldn’t be able to listen to Roy Clark.

Just four years earlier, I had run my first stock-car race, that twenty-five-lapper on a quarter-mile track. You do the math. That’s Aaron’s slogan: “Nobody beats Aaron’s.” Aw, man, there I go again. My first race was all of about six miles long. The Dash Series races were as long as a hundred and fifty miles. And I thought those were marathons. But we’re talking about six hundred miles on a hot afternoon in May with this beast of a race car while sharing the track with NASCAR’s greatest.

What the heck was I doing here?

I knew I had to focus on my goals, which were going to be very different this time.

First goal: Stay out of the way.

Second goal: Finish the race.

I knew I had to stay out of Richard Petty’s way. He’d already told me so. And Kyle Petty’s. He’d been my landlord too. I also needed to give him extra room. And my brother DW, of course. We hadn’t really talked, but I figured I’d better give him some space. And Bill Elliott would be racing for a million dollars that day, a bonus offered by series sponsor Winston for winning three of the four biggest races of the year. Bill had already won two of them. If he won today, he’d have one million dollars. What if I screwed that up?

So as the race started I had these four guys on my brain. And that was messing with me. It seemed like about every lap, one of them was either passing me or catching me. I was driving looking in the mirror. That isn’t any way to go about racing a car. I needed to be looking ahead to learn, not looking back.

My speed was suffering, too. I couldn’t even keep up with the guys I was used to seeing run last. That was getting frustrating. Everyone was passing me.

But I stayed reasonably focused and remembered my goals. Stay out of the way and finish the race. So I pushed on, every lap trying to learn more about this car and how to drive it. As those laps ticked by, I actually started getting better. I started to improve. Finally, I was beginning to keep up with some of those guys. I actually almost passed one of them.

Goal one was being accomplished. I was staying out of the way. In addition to that, I was learning, and I was starting to like what was going on. But just then, about four hundred and fifty miles in, my transmission went—and with it went goal number two.

My day had its share of frustration in the World 600. But all things considered, I was happy with what I’d achieved. I wound up being scored twenty-eighth in the finishing order. I’d run my first Cup race. And I hadn’t made anyone mad.

And guess who won that day?

Ol’ DW.

Darrell, our mom and dad, and Darrell’s team were celebrating in Victory Lane just a couple of hundred yards from where my team and I were staring at a broken transmission. I knew DW was smelling and tasting NASCAR’s finest champagne. Brut, I suspect. But all I could smell was burnt transmission fluid. Sunoco, I suspect.

We were literally only a couple hundred yards apart. But the distance between Margaret and Leroy’s two Cup drivers might as well have been a million miles. There’s a lot of difference between a Cup driver and a Cup winner. I was just beginning my journey.

The first step was
recapping with my team the 600 week in Charlotte. Everybody involved agreed: My first Cup start was a success. I did a good job out there, making the race and running most of it. I logged laps, and I logged a lot of experience. More important, I earned the respect of some of my heroes on the track. But the main guy I needed to impress was my car owner, Dick Bahre. He was paying the bills, all of them except for the help Humpy gave us. If Dick was happy, maybe we could do this again. And Dick was happy.

I remember him chewing on cigar in his trademark cowboy boots and work shirt, smiling, and saying: “We turned some heads out there today. Let’s do that again.”

And that’s exactly what we did. We ran four more races in 1985. We performed a little bit better each week.

My best finish came at Michigan, where I ended up eighteenth. Dick and I were able to secure a bit of sponsorship for the 1986 season, and we ran the whole year. That was the first of twenty-four straight years of me racing in the NASCAR Cup Series full-time.

Thanks to what I’d learned from my dad, I was able to network my way right into Cup. From Bill Borden to Kyle to Richard to Humpy to Dick. That was the path to my first Cup race.

Even today, twenty-five years later,
all those people hold special places in my heart.