Motorsports

Almirola's empty victory

The Tampa driver took no joy from his part in a Busch Series win on Saturday.

By BRANT JAMES
Published June 26, 2007

You're Aric Almirola, and you just won your first race at NASCAR's second-highest level. You should be ecstatic.

Thing is, though you put Joe Gibbs Racing's No. 20 Chevrolet on the pole and led the first 43 laps of Saturday's Busch Series race at Milwaukee, you were called into the pits and told you were being replaced by Denny Hamlin, who was late because the helipad he was to use had cars parked on it. Yes, Hamlin is a Nextel Cup star, the recognized driver of the car, the intended starter that night and has a long relationship with hometown sponsor Rockwell Automation. Almirola knew all that. But 43 laps in, on the lead, this was his race, right? Right? No.

Unhappily, Almirola, a 23-year-old Tampa native, got out of the car. Almost 200 laps later, Hamlin crossed the finish line first, but Almirola was credited with the victory because he started the race. It didn't feel like a win, though, and the $66, 823 winner's purse can't buy back that first Victory Lane shower.

"I thought that could have been my first shot to win a race, " Almirola said Monday on teammate Tony Stewart's satellite radio show. "Turns out I did win the race; I just didn't cross the start/finish line in the car."

Almirola did not return calls Monday, but he added in Stewart's controlled environment, "I respect the decision that was made, (but) at the time I didn't agree with it, and I'm not necessarily saying I agree now." He spent the afternoon meeting with crew members and team officials to express his discontent constructively before saying anything publicly.

"I was just more heartbroken than anything, " said Almirola, who finished a career-best sixth in the Busch Series last week at Kentucky, his fifth start in the No. 20. "Natural instincts of a human being, you get upset, you get feelings hurt, you get mad. I know I hid from the media but only for the simple fact I didn't want to say anything I would have regretted."

Team president J.D. Gibbs said the decision was a "group" one made with team officials and sponsors and that Hamlin did not demand his spot in the car.

But Gibbs said after Almirola qualified for his first Nextel Cup race at Las Vegas this spring that Almirola "is my (developmental) program" that he would invest in him "as much as any parts and pieces."

This is how you develop not only talent but trust? JGR has let down Almirola twice in just a month. First it was unable to effectively run the research and development team that would allow him to gain Nextel Cup experience.

Now this.

Bad information hampers Harvick

Kevin Harvick said all the right things after finishing second to Juan Pablo Montoya on Sunday in the Nextel Cup race at Sonoma, Calif. But he could have been forgiven some agitation.

Told by crew chief Todd Berrier that race leader Jamie McMurray and Montoya (at the time running third) had insufficient fuel to finish, Harvick willingly ceded second with less than 20 laps left.

Maybe Montoya's crew chief, Donnie Wingo, was pulling the snooker of the year by radioing bad information he knew Harvick's team would hear, or maybe his calculations were a little pessimistic.

Maybe Montoya's experience on road courses, though limited in a stock car, allowed him to save more fuel than Wingo imagined possible.

But if Harvick's run hadn't been tainted by ultimately bad information, he would not have let Montoya by to chase down McMurray, at least not without a fuel-consuming battle. And who knows what happens then?

Second life?

Runnerup has been a painful word for Marco Andretti before, particularly in the 2006 Indianapolis 500, but it sounded beautiful on Sunday in Newton, Iowa. The Indy Racing League's rookie of the year and race winner last season finished second to Andretti Green teammate Dario Franchitti but perhaps more important finished his first oval-track race of the season.

Mechanical failures, crashes (such as his violent late cartwheel at Indianapolis this season) and handling issues had prompted him to walk away from or crawl out of his race cars in the previous six oval races, dumping him to a seemingly insurmountable 14th in the standings, 157 points out.

[Last modified June 26, 2007, 02:10:17]