TALLADEGA, Ala. - A costly penalty to Nextel Cup championship contender Jimmie Johnson last week has put NASCAR's longtime method of measuring pit road speeds under intense scrutiny.
"It's just a typical disagreement," said Johnson, who was sent to the rear of the longest line and dropped from fourth to 18th after the disputed call. He eventually lost a lap and wound up 10th, leaving him fourth in points going into today's EA Sports 500 at Talladega Superspeedway.
"I felt I was doing the pit road speed and (NASCAR) thought I was speeding. They have the final say in things, so I had to come down and serve a penalty," Johnson said. "That was last weekend. It's no use really harping on it."
Johnson added the way NASCAR currently measures pit road speed needs updating.
"They have people placed at the start-finish line with stopwatches in their hands that time you as you cross the paint lines on the racetrack," Johnson said. "It's pretty difficult to have the right vantage point for all of pit road, I think; for them to have the right angles and nail each timing line correctly.
"For a while, each car is coming at you and then it's going away from you. That's where it's tough to call it correctly."
Nextel Cup garage boss John Darby said NASCAR has investigated other ways of doing it, but has not found anything better.
"You can't use radar because the focal point of radar is too inaccurate," he said. "Some of the GPS systems are out because it's too easily interfered with from weather and locations of satellites at different times of years. The multiple loop scoring system could be developed for pit road, but it's going to take some time and more work."
The pit road speed limit was instituted after Mike Ritch, a crewman for Bill Elliott, was killed at Atlanta Motor Speedway in 1990 when Ricky Rudd's car slid into Elliott's parked car in the pits.
"You've got to look at the reason we even have a pit road speed," Darby said. "To keep the crew members safe on pit road. In doing that, we also understand there's times when a driver may have to accelerate to avoid an accident, he may have to swerve quickly for something."
NO SHOWS: Despite considerable preparation and planning for a possible protest by a group called the National Association for Minority Race Fans, nobody showed up.
Track officials said they have not heard from the association since Friday when they offered the group a 7-acre area near the main entrance of the track for its proposed protests. There remained the possibility that protesters would turn up today, but track president Grant Lynch said the NAMRF gave no details of its plans to track or law enforcement officials.
The group sent a letter to the state asking to hold a peaceful demonstration at Talladega, prompting track officials to meet with highway patrol and sheriff's department representatives to determine a site on the speedway grounds.
Calls to the association were not returned.
The group's Web site still had a message Saturday stating there would be a protest at Talladega but did not give any details.
HAPPY INDEED: The front-row qualifiers for today's EA Sports 500 showed they could run fast in race trim too. Pole-sitter Joe Nemechek paced the final practice, known as "Happy Hour," with a lap in the draft at 196.358 mph. Rudd, who starts on the outside of Row 1, led the first session at 197.049 mph.
PIT STOPS: NASCAR confiscated the spoiler of the No. 9 Dodge driven by rookie Kasey Kahne for failure to meet the template. The infraction likely will merit a significant penalty, series officials confirmed. ... Blake Feese held off fellow first-year driver Reed Sorenson by 2 car lengths to win the ARCA Food World 300.
