Gaynalysis: Bud Shootout Weekend 2012

The Gaynalysis is just one gay NASCAR fan’s take on the race weekend. You can read the “straight” recap of the Bud Shootout from Daytona by clicking here.

"Gay NASCAR" by Keith J. Varadi - 2009

NASCAR got its Packback!

To everyone (including me) who has been bitching about the two-dog-f**king style of tandem racing that developed at Daytona and Talladega over the past two years….. NASCAR shoved a big jar of STFU in our collective mouths!

Seeing the big clusters of cars packed tightly together all night was fantastic. But with the good comes the bad. There were four “big ones” during this short race.

The scariest moment of the night found Jeff Gordon upside down on his roof for the first time in his cup career. The huge wrecks ruined the nights of Dale Jr, Kasey Kahne, Kevin Harvick, Jimmie Johnson – and a ton of other fast cars.

I did see several comments online from fans who were not a fan of these huge packs – because of the crashes. Granted most of these comments were from car owners. Admittedly, I may have less sympathy for the car owners because I am not the one writing those checks – but in my mind, it was worth the price.

NASCAR has done in incredible job with the safety innovations in these cars – and while racing will never be 100% safe – the only thing damaged in the “big ones” tonight was sheet metal.

We are coming off one of the most action packed seasons in recent memory and NASCAR picked right back off where Tony and Carl left-off in Homestead. The return of the pack style of racing is going to be great for ratings.

I have a tendency to build things up in my mind – and then when the moment arrives and it can’t possibly live up to the hype I have built – I get let down. NOT TONIGHT – the Bud Shootout exceeded my expectations in every way.

This week’s Q4G Shout-Out can only go to Kyle Busch. Heyyyyyyyyy Kyle! He won this award before he won the race when he saved his car from spinning in an astounding way….. TWICE! This was his first race back in the M&M’s car since he was parked last year in Texas for wrecking Ron Hornaday. M&M’s had pulled their logos from the #18 for the last two races of 2011. It also appears the “media coaching” Kyle received off-season worked….. he was hardly recognizable from the @OldKyleBusch in victory lane.

Outside of the racing the weekend was full of drama. It was one crazy Friday. To start the drama NASCAR announced it had asked Phoenix Raceway to rescind their invitation to PGA star Bubba Watson who had been asked to drive his “General Lee” on a parade lap before the race at PIR. Watson recently bought the car at the Barrett-Jackson Auction in Phoenix and is Twitter-BFFs with Denny Hamlin.

NASCAR made the right call. They have been working for years to remove the “southern only” image from the sport and having a car with the Rebel Flag painted on it being paraded around before the race would not help the cause.

For the record, I am huge “Dukes of Hazard” Fan – I had quite the crush on Bo. I also consider myself a child of the south and I understand people that say the General Lee only represents a TV Show – and nothing more.

But the bottom line is that image is everything. Right or wrong – that flag comes with a boat load of baggage. Baggage NASCAR doesn’t need. It would just give ammunition to those that want to bash our sport.

I would rather we keep the focus on the “product.” The 2011 season was incredible and if The Bud Shootout is any indication… 2012 will be another season for the books. Why distract from this? Let Bubba drive the pace car!

Shortly after the General Lee flap – the most unusual story ever broke. Now I know this is going to be hard to believe – but Chad Knaus got caught cheating! I havn’t been this surprised since I learned that buttery spread wasn’t actually butter!

The #48 got pegged by NASCAR for having an illegal C-pillar. Race officials said it would have given Johnson an aero advantage. The sheet metal was cut off the car and the Lowes team had to weld new C-pillars on the car. NASCAR will announce the penalty on Tuesday – but the general feeling in the garage is that Knaus will not be suspended.

Before I close the first Gaynalysis of 2012 – I want to send the thoughts and prayers from everyone here at Q4G to Chris Myers and his family. Chris lost his son in an car accident late last week. RIP Christopher!

Busch Survives Spins – Wins Bud Shootout

[ credit NASCAR Wire Service - by Reid Spencer ]

Credit: Jamie Squire/Getty Image

Kyle Busch rallied from two near-disasters to win Saturday’s Budweiser Shootout at Daytona International Speedway with a slingshot move past Tony Stewart a few yards from the finish line at Daytona International Speedway.

The victory was Busch’s first in the season-opening exhibition race contested in two segments of 25 and 50 laps. His winning margin over Stewart was .013 seconds.

Marcos Ambrose recovered from a pair of wrecks to finish third, followed by Brad Keselowski and Denny Hamlin.

Stewart had just taken the lead on Lap 74 of a scheduled 75 when a violent wreck in Turn 4 sent Jeff Gordon’s No. 24 Chevrolet barrel-rolling through Turn 4 and sliding on its roof toward the entrance to Turn 4.

Gordon was following Kyle Busch on the backstretch, and contact between the cars turned Busch’s toward onto the apron. Busch made a dramatic save for the second time in the race, but Gordon slid up the track into the Chevrolets of Kurt Busch and Jamie McMurray.

As all three cars contacted the outside wall, Jimmie Johnson’s Chevrolet nosed beneath the right rear bumper of Gordon’s car and turned it upside down.

The wreck left 11 cars on the lead lap and sent the race to overtime.

Credit: Jamie Squire/Getty Images

A close call for Kyle Busch on Lap 48 strung the field out, leaving a 10-car pack fighting for the lead. Busch’s Toyota twice turned sideways off the bumper of Johnson, and twice Busch saved the car from calamity despite running onto the apron in Turn 2.

The complexion of the race changed dramatically on Lap 55, when a chain-reaction wreck that started with contact between the cars of polesitter Martin Truex Jr., Ambrose and Joey Logano clobbered those three vehicles and eliminated Dale Earnhardt Jr., Kevin Harvick and Matt Kenseth.

The resulting fourth caution of the race bunched the field for a restart on Lap 62, with Greg Biffle in the lead, followed by Hendrick Motorsports teammates Gordon and Johnson and reigning NASCAR Sprint Cup Series champion Stewart.

The race was barely eight laps old when contact from David Ragan’s Ford turned Paul Menard’s Chevrolet and ignited a multicar wreck that also damaged the cars of Kasey Kahne, Denny Hamlin, Matt Kenseth, Juan Pablo Montoya, Michael Waltrip, Jeff Burton and Gordon.

Earnhardt, who had led the first three laps, had just regained the top spot on Lap 8 and was out in front when the wreck erupted behind him. The crash sidelined Menard, Ragan and Waltrip and knocked Hamlin and Kahne off the lead lap. Burton also fell of the lead lap during the first 25-lap segment when he pitted under green with a cut tire.

“Everybody was real racy and I just got into the back of Menard,” Ragan said after exiting his car. “You get a good run, and you’re pushing a little bit, and I guess he was pushing whoever was in front of him. And when you’ve got the meat in between the sandwich, you usually get wrecked.”

McMurray was at the front of the field when NASCAR called the competition caution after Lap 25. Gordon, undeterred by minor damage to his car, was second, followed by Harvick, Kyle Busch and Ambrose.

Podcast – Out of the Tunnel Show #3

Show number three is in the books. Please bare with some of our technical issues – we plan to have everything perfect by Homestead.

This week Hannah and I talk about Kasey’s knee surgery, the odd sponsorships of HendrickCars.com, our Racing Shows are back, the Red Bull cars find a home, Hannah gives us an NHRA recap and there’s gonna be a new short track in Daytona.

Plus, Adam Lovelace joins us on the line for our race picks!

Click the play button:

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if that embedded player does not work for you – Click here to download the show…

The Out of the Tunnel is sponsored by Audible.com. Listeners of the show can get a FREE audio book download by visiting: www.audibletrial.com/OutOfTheTunnel

Top Gear US – Hitting the Redline

credit The History Channel

After a break, the second half of the Top Gear season kicked off tonight on the History Channel. If you havn’t yet checked out this show – you need to watch. If you watched in the first season and didn’t get hooked, give it another chance – you need to watch. Hell, even if you only love the BBC version of this show – you need to watch.

The BBC version of TG has a cult like following – so many of the TG faithful were not willing to give the American hosts a chance.

I do think the show had a slow start out of the gates in the first season. Most of the BBC “snobs” were bashing Top Gear US before the show show even aired. There were also folks who had no idea what Top Gear BBC was – but they also didn’t know to they needed to check out the History Channel for a car show. It also took some time for the American producers and hosts to make it their own.

I think it took a season for Rutledge Wood, Tanner Foust and Adam Ferrara to find their groove. The chemisty is now in-tune and the three play off each other – ribbing, prodding and humiliating each other at every turn. You can tell they genuinly like each other and cut-up just like they would if the cameras and pop-tops were off.

(I think I just aged myself with that pop-top reference. Kids, a pop-top is the removable tab on alumnim cans that we had when I grew up. You would pull the sharpe tab completely off the can – they were like little razor blades and everytime I went to the pool or beach I feared slicing my foot open by stepping on one. You may have heard this term, pop-top, in the Jimmy Buffet song “Magaritiville.”)

(OK, I may have just aged myself with that Jimmy Buffet reference. Kids, Jimmy Buffet is a singer/songwriter that your Mom and Dad listen to when they would get drunk and screw.)

As a car guy, Top Gear is the most fun you can have on TV. The formula is simple: take three grown-up men acting like giggling teenagers, throw in some really fast cars, crazy stunts and funny writing…..

If you are not watching Top Gear US – you need to watch.

The show comes on the History Channel every Tuesday night at 9pm.

Click here to see clips and learn more about the show.

Get to Know Your Driver Through His Stomach: Carl Edwards

From time to time – I like to throw these rapid-fire gastronomical questions at a driver if I get the chance. I don’t like to interrupt folks from the traveling media who have “important” questions to ask… but once those folks are done I can sometimes sneak these questions in. I had the chance during the Banquet week in Las Vegas back in December to ask a few drivers about their dietary habits. I will feature these over the coming weeks of the off-season. In this installment we talk to Carl Edwards:

Question	Carl Edwards’ Answers

Orange Juice: Pulp or No-Pulp?	pulp

Grilled Cheese: White Bread or Wheat Bread	wheat bread

Chocolate Milk Shake: w/ Chocolate Ice Cream OR w/ Vanilla Ice Cream and Chocolate Syrup	Vanilla w/ Chocolate Syrup

BBQ – Dry Rub or Sauce	sauce

at a cookout – Hotdog or Hamburger	hamburger

How do you like your eggs	scrambled

Favorite Pizza Topping	Canadian Bacon

Favorite Junk Food	Chocolate

Favorite Health Food	Subway (said with a grin)

Podcast – Out of the Tunnel – Show 2

credit Hannah Rickards' iPhone

It is time for show #2 of “Out of Tunnel.” Hannah and I are getting a better handle on the equipment and I hope the sound qualilty is going to improve each week. This week our voices should be coming out of both sides of your speakers.

In show #2 – we “almost” have an interview with Kevin Harvick. Well, I lost all the audio, so Hannah and I re-create the interview through theater of the mind. We talk about all the big news from the Media Tour last week, plus our take on Danica buying a spot in the Daytona 500. That plus: DeLana is preggers and Kasey Kahne can’t get out of Jury Duty.

We also welcome our new sponsor: Audible.com. Listeners of the show can get a FREE audio book download by visiting: www.audibletrial.com/OutOfTheTunnel

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO THE SHOW:

Kevin Harvick Plays Craps

Kevin Harvick was in Las Vegas to help promote the upcoming NASCAR Race in March. He played craps at the Bellagio with some media members as well as a few lucky fans. The craps play wasn’t for “real” money – each person started with a set number of chips and whomever had the highest chip count after 20 minutes won a prize. The media winner took home an autographed diecast while the winning fan got a signed Kevin Harvick helmet. Each of the fans who played also won tickets to the Vegas race.

Now, cut to the bad part for me….. there I was with my fancy-ass new recorder getting ready for my one-on-one interview with Harvick… I had all of my questions written down and had practiced them. Note to self, no matter how fancy your new recorder is – it needs to be in record mode and not cue to capture audio. I got home later to check the interview and the spot on the “tape” was blank! I guess I got too nervous and rushed it when I stepped in front of Harvick.

Harvick and I talked mostly about Vegas – he grew up in California, raced here as a kid, took his late teens “right of passage” trip here and got married in Vegas. This is second time back here since the banquet in December.

I even got Kevin to record an intro for our podcast…”I am Kevin Harvick and you’re listening to Out of the Tunnel.” – well I got Kevin to say that… the recording of it… not so much

Here are some of the pics and video that I did manage to “capture” of the craps game.

credit Michael Myers / Q4G

Top 5 Things I Learned from not going on the Media Tour

I wasn’t in Charlotte for the Sprint Media Tour. I had to work and wasn’t even following the minute by minute deluge of information on Twitter from the reporters who were there – but I have been catching up on the news of the week.

All in all, there really wasn’t a ton of groundbreaking news – at least compared to the tectonic shuffle in recent weeks that nearly every race team has seen since the cars were loaded ino the hauler in Homestead.

So, here are the Top-5 things that struck me from reading about the Media Tour:

5: No More Secret Fines!

Credit: Jared C. Tilton / Getty Images for NASCAR

The news actually came in a statement released by NASCAR near the end of the media tour. ”NASCAR will no longer issue fines that are undisclosed, we looked at this issue from every angle and gathered feedback from the industry. While there are always sensitivities related to sponsor relationships and other leagues may continue issuing disclosed and undisclosed fines, NASCAR has decided that all fines moving forward will be made public after the competitor or organization that has been penalized has been informed.”

I would tell you how I feel about this rules change…. but its a secret. Bewteen you and me, I am a horrible secret keeper – so I’ll tell you about my secret thoughts on secret fines no longer being secret: I LOVE IT. I look at “fines” as part of how our sport is officiated. If a player is ejected from a football game – the fans see it. Then, faster than a Daytona lap – the NFL Commisioner would issue a fine and make it public.

But in NASCAR, the fans might see a driver wreck someone on the track, then get hauled into the black Hauler….. but that was all we would see. The drivers usally walk out of those meetings looking like a small kid who got his candy taken away by his Mother because he wasn’t sharing his candy with his brother.

If NASCAR wasn’t saying anything after the hauler meeting….you can bet the gay farm that the drivers lips will be sealed up tighter than Kenny Wallace’s sphinctor at a Lady GaGa concert. (and for the record, the Herminator is a paws-up Lil’ Monster)

I think it was a great move by NASCAR….. bring all of it out into the track lights.

4. Brendan Gaughn – getting a Cup Ride.

Credit: Jared C. Tilton/Getty Images for NASCAR

…. well, at least for a few races. Richard Childress Racing announced that it would add a 4th car for the first five races. Elliott Sadler will take the first race in Daytona with Brendan Gaughn running the next four races in a South Point Casino painted car. Gaughn will also be running in the Nationwide and Truck Series for RCR.

In an interview with Queer4Gears late last season, Gaughn said, “….wherever I go next year, if I’m not winning races it will be my last year.” He is putting a lot of pressure on himself this season. He wants one last chance to get in good equipment and prove his skills to others – but mostly himself. ”If Kevin (Harvick) can get of that (Nationwide) race car and finish 3rd, I need to be able to finish in the Top-5. I mean, if they’re doing it every week, if the equipment is that good….. then, I believe in myself and I believe I can still do it. So I want that definitive moment that says: It’s you or it’s not you………and let’s go make a career (on track) or go home to sell cars.”

3. Kasey Kahne is bad at coming up with excuses:

The Sprint Media Tour is scheduled months in advance – drivers schedules are cleared and their teams trot them out in front of hundreds of well fed reporters. It was almost two years ago we first learned that Kasey Kahne was coming to Hendrick to drive the #5. But – while Jimmie, Jeff and Juinor were on hand to take questions – there was no Kasey.

Had he been kidnapped by the rabid pro-breast feeding movement? Was he flipping over a fence in his dirt car? Nope – turns out Kasey had Jury Duty. While I thank him for doing his civic duty and all……. he needs some help from his PR rep on coming up with a better excuse to get out of Jury Duty.

He could proabably get out of it if had been the Mayfield Case.

2. The New 2013 Ford Fusion Looks Good

credit Ford Racing

I was really excited to finally see what NASCAR and the manufactures have been promising for 2013. Finally – cars that look at least somewhat similar to what is being sold on the lots.

I am not “in love” with it – honestly, it looks more Aston Martin than Ford to me – but it makes me more excited to see what Dodge, Chevy and Toyota will be introducing soon.

Will it silence those fans who have been bitching about the COT for years? No, of course not!

1. DeLana is Preggers

credit: Tom Whitmore/Getty Images for NASCAR

The biggest news of the week by far is that Kevin and DeLana Harvick are expecting a baby!

Congratulations – probably a good thing you sold that race team… they are gonna need a little more free time to not sleep.

Like all parents, who will do anything for their child – Kevin and DeLana will soon learn that is in fact is that kid who wears the firesuit in the family.

How Does Rosie Know?

Rosie O’Donnell is convinced…..that Tom Cruise isn’t gay!

The other night on Piers Morgan Tonight Rosie told America that she was super-sure Tom isn’t a big ole’ homo – wanna know how she can be sooo certain. Turns out, Tom drives race cars. Rosie said:

“A lot of people have said to me oh you know so and so…are they gay? I personally don’t know a star who I have come to know and become intimately friendly in my life with who is living a false reality. I don’t, I really don’t. People say to me all the time ‘Tom Cruise is gay.’ I’ve been around Tom Cruise a lot. Tom Cruise drives race cars. I do not think Tom Cruise is gay.”

The video is not online – but you can hear the audio here in a segment from The Gary and Dino Show. Gary and Dino played the clip from CNN and you can hear how, even Piers is incredulous at Rosie’s comment.

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Not all gay dudes are into hair dressing, decorating and musical theater – not all lesbians are into home improvement and drive dual axl trucks!

I was kinda shocked to hear such an ignorant statement coming from Rosie. Rick Santorum maybe, but not Rosie!

All stereotypes are based somewhat in reality – otherwise they wouldn’t exist. But maybe Rosie could come up with better reasoning.

Perhaps if she really thought about it – Rosie could come up with other reasons she knows Tom isn’t gay. If for instance – she had seen him spend time lovingly with his wife and children or if she had never seen him having sex with a dude….. those might be more concrete examples of how she “knows” he isn’t gay.

Rosie needs to meet Evan Darling and read the recent story on Q4G about openly gay F1 Driver Mike Beuttler – heck, she should just add Queers4Gears to her bookmarks. We even welcome straight readers like…. Tom Cruise. (allegedly)

(thanks to the Gary and Dino Show for the Audio – everyone needs to listen to their show online or on iTunes.)

Queers4Gears.com

NASCAR and MotorSports – From a Queer Perspective