Back From Bristol

Maybe it was the freezing cold or maybe it was the intermitant snow, but this year’s crash-and-bang show at the Bristol Motor Speedway seemed to carry a lot more rancor than usual. As I sat in the post-race traffic, I could see the temptation to cease with the endless patience required to navigate Volunteer Parkway, as 160,000 people try to get on I-81 (all seemingly north), by smacking a few cars around. But that, that would be wrong. Miss Food City would be angered.

Nevertheless, I don’t get the fuss myself. I find myself sort of agreeing with Marty Smith. "Moving guys" at places like Atlanta is dumb and scary. But bump and run is what you do at Bristol. You can’t pass anyone- it is a one groove racetrack- so you got to move them out of the way. Kurt Busch put a perfect slide on Matt Kenseth for the win. And Jeff Gordon has moved a lot of people in his time in Nextel Cup- so he can't complain too much about ending up in the wall on the last lap.

The bump and run is one of those odd things in sports- where the rule on paper doesn’t mean all that much, but the potential for participant retaliation keeps folks in line. Whether it is pitching inside in baseball, carrying your stick carelessly in hockey or using a stock car to move another stock car out of the way- the formal rules seem to have to less to do with the resulting etiquette than the fear of informal “outside-the-rules” retaliation does. Everyone knows the code for pitching inside. Hit a guy once- no problem; it happens. Make a habit of it… and its your teammates that pay the price.

Ultimately, NASCAR is sort of faced with the same happy dilemma- which is why Jeff Gordon is only faced with a modest fine for punching the man who spun him trying to smack and pass on the last lap. Wink & nod: best let them sort it out themselves. These drivers have to face each other week after week, in positions where they’ll be vulnerable to a firm tap. They know where you can bump aggressively (Martinsville, Bristol) and where you can’t. Outside of real craziness and token displeasure, let them police themselves. Each and every driver has the ability to wreak havoc on another competitor any Sunday- and the history of the sport has shown they aren’t shy to use that power on those the community finds irredeemably stupid.