February 5, 2012
By Kim Roberson
Kim Roberson
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It seems the hot topic of the week before the week we go back to racing in 2012, has something to do with points swapping or sharing.
In this case, it has to do with the fact that Stewart Haas Racing (SHR) and Tommy Baldwin Racing (TBR) have teamed up to provide a full 36-race schedule for one car being split between two drivers.
The one car will be the 10, and the two drivers will be Danica Patrick and David Reutimann. Apparently, no one has a problem with the Reutimann part of the transaction, but they are having a really hard time with the Patrick part.
Personally, I am having a hard time understanding what the furor is all about.
This is hardly the first time a team has swapped or purchased the points from a previous year’s top 35 team just so they could get a guaranteed starting spot in the first five races of the season. As a matter of fact, I can’t remember a year recently when it hasn’t happened.
Just last year, the Wood Brothers teamed with Richard Petty Motorsports to ensure that the No. 21 Ford driven by Trevor Bayne would have a guaranteed spot in the Daytona 500. That move was advantageous in two ways. First, Bayne crashed out of his qualifying race, which would have meant without the Petty deal, he wouldn’t have made the race. And second, if he hadn’t been in the race, he couldn’t have won it.
In 2010, several teams swapped points. Furniture Row Racing bought the “rights” to use the former No. 07 team’s points; Front Row Racing bought the points from the defunct Hall of Fame Racing No. 96 car and applied them to Kevin Conway’s No. 37 car.
In 2009, 11 teams swapped numbers and points to ensure a start in the Daytona 500.
So, it can’t just be the points swap that is causing the ripples of discontent.
Then maybe it is because Danica is a rookie and shouldn’t be guaranteed a slot in the 500?
Again, I point back to last year, when Trevor Bayne had just one more Cup race under his belt than Danica does this year. I remind you how that turned out for the 20-year old kid. (Big trophy, lots of money, car in Daytona USA.) Two years ago, Kevin Conway had never raced at a Superspeedway when he received his automatic entry.
It isn’t as if Danica has never raced at Daytona before. As a matter of fact, last year she became the first woman to lead a lap there in ANY car as she led laps during the July Nationwide race -- a race where she had a top 10 finish. She might not have raced a Cup car before, but then again, what rookie does race a Cup car before their first race in Cup? Rookies do it every year. And you can’t just walk up and say “I want to race at Daytona”. You have to qualify to race there, having provided NASCAR with proof that you can handle the track and the car in race conditions. She did that by first starting in ARCA, and then Nationwide. It isn’t like she is making her first ever NASCAR start in three weeks on the 2.5 mile track.
It also can’t be that one car is being split between two different drivers. That happens in the Nationwide Series all the time, and has happened more than once on the Cup side. Lower-funded teams have often worked with drivers to bring someone with special skills on a certain track, or a past champions provisional, and to ensure they make a race.
That leaves me with her being a “her”.
I read someplace this week that the only reason Danica is getting the start and the points is because she looks good in a bikini. Are you kidding me?
It isn’t because she has proven she can handle the car, or that she has raced for over a decade in other forms of motorsports. It is because she is pretty. So, if someone hit her with an ugly stick and all of this points swapping happened, this wouldn’t be such a problem?
I seem to remember last year everyone commenting on how “adorable” and “cute” Trevor Bayne is. He has female fans falling over themselves to get a picture or an autograph. Yet no one seems to hold his looks against him. Carl Edwards has appeared shirtless on the covers of many magazines. He is happy to show off his chiseled six pack abs and well-toned body. Yet no one says “well, because he looks great without clothes on, he can’t possibly be a good race car driver.”
Just what year is this?
The deal that SHR and TBR struck this week to ensure that both Danica Patrick and David Reutimann are in the first five races of the season is nothing that hasn’t happened before. And if it has been done just to benefit Reutimann, I sincerely doubt there would have been a single peep about it. But because Reutimann is splitting time with a good looking brunette who has proven in the past that she is fully capable of handling a NASCAR stock car, it is a huge deal.
I say more power to her, and to Reutimann.
I hope they start off strong at Daytona, and between the two of them, have a great year. And maybe, by the end of the season, everyone will have gotten past the SHR-TBR deal and just look at the No. 10 as just another car on the racetrack that just happens to be driven by two different drivers.
Follow Kim on Twitter: @ksrgatorfn
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