(AP Photo/Mike McCarn)
Brian Vickers’ Chase Diary: ‘Anything can happen in our sport’
(Sporting News) - Brian Vickers made a big splash at Talladega before the competition began, riding around the track in Tommy Kendall's notorious Chicken Car, decorated with the gigantic head and tail of a rooster. In Sunday's Amp Energy 500, Vickers had a front-row seat for the 13-car Lap 190 crash that froze the field and made a winner of Jamie McMurray. Vickers dodged spinning cars and finished 13th. He remains 12th in the Sprint Cup standings, 556 points behind Chase for the Sprint Cup leader Jimmie Johnson.
In the eighth installment of his Chase diary, Vickers talks about the Chicken Car, NASCAR's stern prerace warning to drivers about bump-drafting and push-drafting in the corners, the inevitability of a major wreck at Talladega, Sunday's crash on Lap 190, the chances of someone unseating Jimmie Johnson and his fondness for Texas-the racetrack and the state:
"The Chicken Car. T.K. found that car a long time ago. I'm not sure exactly where and how, but that was Tommy Kendall's car. He's had it for some time. Talladega just happened to be its national debut. There's a name for the Chicken Car. Tommy calls it 'El Gallo'-that's 'rooster' in Spanish.
"(NASCAR's warning) did change the race quite a bit, I think. It looked like everybody was much calmer, and they took the warning about bumping in the corners seriously. Some people were still bumping on the straightaway, but it changed things. ... But it didn't prevent a crash, which I didn't expect it would. I'm not 100 percent certain what the intention of the rule was, but if the intention of the rule was to prevent a crash, then, obviously, you can pretty much say that didn't work.
"Everybody gets wound up over the crashes at Daytona and Talladega, because they're bigger, but they're only bigger because there are a bunch of cars in a pack. They're not bigger because they're at Daytona and Talladega, and it has nothing to do with the rules. We find ways to crash each other everywhere - it's not just at Daytona and Talladega that we find ways to crash each other. The only difference is, at those racetracks the crashes are just bigger because everybody's bunched up.
"Like at Loudon earlier this year (in June), there was a big crash there on the restart when we were racing double-file. It was big because there were a bunch of cars in one big pack. But that happened at Loudon and resulted in a (big) pileup (eight cars). There are other tracks where cars get upside down. I guess what I'm trying to say is that, on average, we probably have fewer crashes at Talladega and Daytona than we do anywhere else. There's some tracks where we'll have more than 10 cautions.
"There's a lot of tracks on the circuit - Texas, Charlotte, Atlanta, California, Indianapolis, Kansas, Chicago - we go faster at those tracks than we do at Daytona and Talladega. So it's just not a speed thing, either. When you have 43 drivers going 200 mph inches apart from each other, somebody's going to make a mistake. It's inevitable. We're all human. And when somebody makes a mistake, there's going to be a big crash. No matter what rules you implement, it's not going to change that.
"That was a close one (escaping the final wreck). The 09 (Brad Keselowski) was right in front of me, and coming out of Turn 4 - in between Turn 4 and the trioval - the 09 just turned the 2 (Kurt Busch). And he (Keselowski) needs to settle down, because he's a little bit out of control. He's just very impatient. Yeah, the 09 wrecked the 2, and it was for like 10th place. I barely missed the 2 and I barely missed the 82 (Scott Speed), and it was a mess, to say the least.
"I think there's still hope (for others in the Chase). Things can happen. (Johnson) can blow a motor, he can cut a tire. A lot of things can happen, so we'll see. I don't think you should give him the trophy yet. There are still a lot of things still up in the air. Jimmie and those guys have done a tremendous job, and good for them. That's the bottom line. But I don't think you should hand them the trophy, either. Anything can happen in our sport. And we've seen it time and time again where anything does happen.
"I love Texas. It's a great place to drive. I always look forward to going back. There's something about Texas. I get to go down there and ride horses and see friends - I just love that area down there. We'll go there and just keep doing what we're doing. We're going to try some new stuff with the setup and see what we've got."
Updated November 4, 2009
