ZuDfunck

It's Onto Martinsville, and Let's Wreck There

The splendor of Martinsville begins today with Qualifying at 330 EDT, Nationwide is off but the Truck race will take its place on FOX Saturday at 3 EDT, and the dodge ‘emcar masterpiece will be Sunday at 130 EDT.  Haven’t had time to check the weather but here’s hoping we get a solid weekend of clear weather for a change.

As in previous post we will be pulling for a grand Blue victory for the NAPA/MWR team as it transforms from the Dale Jarret era to the new guy pictured on the right. As well as the UCLA Bruins march into Final Four Madness.

As to the new guy Michael McDowell, part of his prep included:

McDowell's immediate mission is making the most out of nearly $3,000 spent creating a "poor man's" computer simulator, with a steering wheel, pedals and chair. The Phoenix native and one-time driving school instructor is encouraged by how the programs have carried over to testing and can't wait to convert 750 virtual laps at Martinsville into the real thing. Source

Big Blue Weekend: Waltrip and Love

Blue will be the color but hopefully not the tone as Kevin Love faces off in NCAA Sweet Sixteen and Michael Waltrip avoids the walls of Martinsville.
Turns out Kevin's uncle is Mike Love of the Beach Boys and of course everyone knows Mikie's brother.
So the Blue of the Bruins and the Blue of NAPA will be the colors to wear and root for this fabulous weekend! 'Wouldn't it be Nice'

Major League Baseball as Nuts as NASCAR?

Just when you thought NASCAR would have no competition for craziness, case in point California when they sent race cars out on wet pavement and crashed a few cars in February. MLB decides to open their season in Japan at 6 AM eastern time! And then DirecTV has technical difficulties:

Not everybody could see the Red Sox-Athletics baseball opener in Tokyo on Tuesday. Satellite TV provider DirecTV, in about 16.8 million households, said in a statement it had "temporary technical difficulties" during the game with "some channels" — including game coverage on ESPN2 and Red Sox regional carrier NESN. They'll try again Wednesday at 6 a.m. ET

Wonder if it was a Fox broadcast would this have happened? (Fox owns DirecTV)
But I am just cranky because I am going through withdrawal from The Sprint Cup series having had their annual Easter break. All will be forgiven shortly as NASCAR comes to Martinsville this coming Weekend!
A Good Ol' short track race will heal all wounds.

There's A Rotten Egg In ZuD's Easter Basket

Lord only knows what will be on Fox this Sunday at mid afternoon.

It certainly won’t be cars zooming 'round an oval in all their splendor and majesty.

Maybe because they don’t want to be going against March Madness or they are all busy find Easter eggs but one things clear, NASCAR Sprint Cup will be silent!

And like the rotten eggs that no doubt will be prevalent on that day so will sad fans everywhere miss the best sport going these days.

Now some may say the Lords rising out of a cave trumps stock car racing but I am selfish and narrow focused on what I want when I want it.

So I would suggest Speed Channel unwrap one of their highlight packages or rerun some great race of recent time and give us NASCAR junkies something to watch besides the twenty seventh running of The Ten Commandments.

I suppose I could record the Nationwide race and not watch it until Sunday but no doubt I would learn the winner by Sunday AM and have that spoiled so I am opening this post up to you to see what you will be doing this Sunday to placate your addiction.

Send me an email or put it in a comment and we will at least have hope. In lieu of that Happy Spring and have a lovely first day of March Madness!

Let's Get Tony Stewart A Wax Job

Here is a good cause and a challenge to Tony Stewart from Kevin Harvick During the Daytona 500 pre-race show, Tony Stewart held up a photograph of Ronald McDonald that had been altered so it appeared that Kevin Harvick was wearing Ronald's suit. Now, those of you who are familiar with Kevin know that he does not let a practical joke go unanswered. So here is Kevin's retort: Kevin's new colors may indeed be similar to those of Ronald McDonald, but have you seen Tony Stewart's chest and back? Because Tony is such a great guy, he has offered up a solution to his follicle issues. Tony said on his SIRIUS satellite radio show, Tony Stewart Live, that if someone would raise $100,000 for charity, he would wax his chest and back. Who are we to pass up an offer like that? Call it "revenge for the Ronald McDonald photo," call it a great opportunity to raise money for Victory Junction Gang Camp or just call it plain funny. (Think Tony will scream like a girl when they rip all that hair out?) When Smoke caught wind of Kevin's challenge, he issued a counter-challenge: If Kevin and his fans collect the $100,000...Tony will match it for the opportunity to shave Kevin's head bald with a razor. Kevin is game...so let's do it!! Visit Happy's eSHOP and make your donation. You can donate in increments of $1.00, $5.00, $10.00, $25.00, $50.00, $100.00, $500.00, $1000.00 and $5000.00. Every penny collected in "Operation: Wax Smoke" will be donated to Victory Junction Gang Camp. We will be accepting donations until we reach our goal.

Cancer Won't Get This NASCAR Blogger Down

Every so often life comes and kicks ya when your down. But it is the strong that overcome such injustices and rise above. ZuD found such a person in the NASCAR blogging community:

I have a big Daytona 500 Party every year. If the Oncologist pushes Monday morning for chemotherapy I will put him off. Nothing needs to or will happen until after that race. In the past I have had friends fly in from the Florida Keys, Central Florida and Texas, just for this party.Cancer does not get my party this year and I’m hoping, not any year after that.
I’m choosing my friends, family and love of racing over cancer. It’s a disease. It is not who I am.

Indications are she is doing OK and was able to have her party prior to dealing with her Cancer. I cite this person as a testament to the courage life demands of us and how gracefully women deal with crisis.

Random Thoughts on Bristol Race

Darrel Waltrip should of taken the day off, hard to listen to that voice when it got toward the end

Hard to balance the Men’s NCAA Basketball Tourney coverage, NBA on ABC and finally getting two DVD’s I had been hankering for:
No Country for Old Men & American Gangster

So we really didn’t see much of the Bristol Race
I did see Harvick take out Tony wish I had Sirius Radio so I could hear Kevin talk to Tony about it tonight.

We did however get some twelve new Followers to ZuD’s twitter account and although I know little or nothing about twitter I did find an iPhone application called PocketTweets that consolidates most transactions.

NASCAR Fans Get on Twitter

Lets meet on Twitter! The video below explains the concept and how easy it is to Join. Yeah it's free so what's stopping you from joining this year old phenomena. And if your on it already or soon to join add ol' ZuD to your follow list and I shall do the same.

I am trying to get fellow NASCAR fans on it cause right now there are mostly just Techies and Geeks.
Let's get the NASCAR nation Twittering!

Tony Stewart Still Smokin' Over Tires

In a Martinsville press gathering Tony Stewart is still going on 'bout the tires used at Atlanta:

"You finally get to the point where, if you get frustrated enough, now it's gone from doing things in a nice, calm manner to I want to make sure I get somebody's attention about this," Stewart said Wednesday. He had called the tires "the most pathetic racing tire I've ever been on in my professional career."

"Guys are screaming at their crew chiefs that it was the worst car they've ever driven. Well, it wasn't the crew chief's fault. It wasn't the team's fault. These guys spend millions of dollars to build these cars. It was the tire we were running and tires should never, ever be the deciding factor in a race."

"For them to say that they were satisfied with the race, that's insane," Stewart said. "If they really firmly believe that, if they believe what they put out in their press statement that they were happy with the result, that scares me to death."

Source

Kobalt Tools 500 was Kobalt Tools 1000, The Reason, Tires

Not only did Toyota win their first race the race Sucked! To use a racing term.
The reason is simple read these quotes via USAToday:

Tony Stewart

"I'm going home and taking everything that has Goodyears off and put Firestones on and feel a lot safer," Stewart said. "It's a shame these teams that work so hard are being dictated by a company incapable of building tires fit for a street car."

"If they can't do any better than that, they ought to just pull out," he said. "I guarantee Hoosier or Firestone or somebody could do a lot better job."

Dale Earnhardt Jr

"I ain't going to put up with this," Earnhardt said. "I don't think any other drivers (are). ... We couldn't run side-by-side. We'd wreck. We had to let each other go by. Every time you got beside a guy, you were just like, 'Take it.' I couldn't go in the corner side by side. No one else out there really could, either."

Source: Nate Ryan USAToday

What Do You Do During NASCAR Weather Delays?

Every weekend I spend some 20 hours viewing Qualifying, Practice and Racing. When weather interrupts that viewing and endless replays of “Back in the Day’ come on I typically go over to the news channels and get caught up on what the political news is. But what do you do fellow Zuddies? If your lucky enough to have a mate you might indulge in cuddling or do you leave the house and go shopping or does your mate force you into long ignored chores or errands?

For me It’s a tough choice because the networks love to keep you in suspense not specifically saying if the event will continue or if it will cancel it altogether. The most recent example of being held in suspense was California when we spent all of Sunday waiting and waiting to have the race rescheduled for the following day.

So do tell, either in the comments or in an email what do you do during weather delays?

ZuDfunck, Whats A Oil Reservoir Cap?

Glad you asked. I have images of what it looks like on an old car courtesy Stock Car Science but I think it is basically the same on the new as far as the advantage it creates her blog has this:

First, the location.  Unlike your car, the oil in a NASCAR car isn’t stored in the engine (which would be a wet sump system).  NASCAR uses a dry sump system, in which oil is stored in an oil tank reservoir. The oil tanktank. You can see a picture of the oil reservoir in the Stock Car Science Building A Car section. The sheet metal plays an important role in minimizing heat radiating into the car, traps fumes from the hot oil, and serves as an additional firewall. This function is so important that NASCAR doesn’t allow the top of the tank to be attached using quick connect fasteners. The teams usually duct tape the lid on. The picture below shows the location of the oil tank with respect to the chassis. It doesn’t show the cover, which would sit on top of the tank. (added) The oil reservior itself is closed and pressurized.

So if the oil tank cover plays such an important role, why would you leave it loose, much less leave it off? The answer is aerodynamics. The air exerts forces on the car in different directions. We give different names to those forces depending on the direction in which they act. Drag is the force air creates along the length of the car. Air creates drag when it hits the front of the car, but it also creates drag when it gets inside the car because there is no way for it to get out. Drag always acts opposite the direction the car is trying to move, so you want to eliminate as much drag as possible.

Robby Gordon Has Reason To Smile Again

This snakebit dude hasn't had much reason to smile until today, but with NASCAR rescinding his penalty for an illegal front bumper he can get back to doing what he does best, finishing in the Top 15 race in, race out. Says Robby:

"We are grateful the commissioners rescinded the points penalty and suspension but disappointed by the fine," Gordon said. "Still, we see this as a victory for Robby Gordon Motorsports. We feel like justice was done and appreciate NASCAR creating a system that allowed us to take our appeal to the ... commission."

SOURCE

Fashionably Themed Affordable NASCAR Attire

Ace out the typical NASCAR vendors at the tracks and online with these unique offerings at a fraction of the cost. Be unique yet have money left over to buy other essentials. At your service night and day, ZuD's looking out for you:

SOURCE

Carl Edwards Gets His Car Number Plus 1 Deducted by NASCAR

John Cena, I mean Carl Edwards, get 100 points taken away dropping him to seventh going into Wrestlemania, I mean Atlanta's Kobalt Tools 500.

He does however get to keep the WWE championship belt, I mean the Las Vegas Motor Speedway’s title belt he won last Sunday.

Penalized for having a cover missing from the oil reservoir tank which NASCAR says provided him an advantage in winning the UAW-Dodge 400.

"I'm not going to let this affect me," Edwards told the Associated Press. "All I am going to say is, we're all going to keep doing what we can do, and go as fast as we can. And I'm just going to keep doing what I'm doing."

Roush Fenway president Geoff Smith said the team had 10 days to decide if it will appeal.

"So, you get 100 points for putting rocket fuel in your car, and then you get 100 points for a bolt coming too loose?" Smith asked. "There seems to be a little inconsistency here, and we're being penalized for something we aren't even sure gave an added performance to the car."

SOURCE

Brett Favre to Join NFL Today on CBS or NASCAR?

As we speculate on Brett Favres' future I would like to see Brett get hired by CBS Sports to replace Shannon Sharpe, that marble mouthed dude has outlived his welcome and if that's not possible put Brett in the wings with the third segment and maybe supplant Boomer or Marino down the road.
That of course is ZuD's second choice, as we would love to see him go into NASCAR. Probably not as a driver as in college he had a near death experience driving. For all we know he doesn't even drive a car anymore after that. But as former NFL quarterbacks such as Aikman and Staubach have shown it is a fertile field for once great, washed up quarterbacks.

USA Today's Sports Media God has a take on all this.

Tuesday, networks wouldn't elaborate on plans to corral Favre. Which isn't surprising, given nobody likes to end up looking like an also-ran if they don't succeed. And networks figure there's no point in having their on-air types fret about being dumped for Favre — until, that is, that actually happens.

 

Kasey Kahne Stalkers Uncovered

These ladies obsessed with the new driver for Budweisers Beer are still at it in this ad, no doubt you've seen it. Poor Kasey gets transported into a dream sequence where he shows his moves are not just confined to the racetrack:

The ladies are: the redhead is Judy Fleming, the brunette is Dana Gilhooley and the blonde is Jen Biederman

We here at ZuD will track their careers as a public service as more is being written about them as the series of commercials grab momentum. Zud's favorite, in the middle, is featured in a DVD movie in which she is a Lesbian. The redhead seems to be garnering most of the attention in these two articles and the blonde, well she's a blonde.

US Armed Forces Using NASCAR to Solicit Young Men

According to this article in last months’ NASCAR.com it does. The demographics of NASCAR fans match up well with the recruitment target of the United States Armed Forces. So that’s why you see so many military branches of the government going after the top racing teams in NASCAR.

ZuD is a bit beyond that demographic group but I can tell ya there are racing days that I used to get an uncontrollable urge to buy Reese’s peanut butter cups cause Harvick was up in the top 10 most of the day. So why not attract the attention of kids leaving high school and seeing few options ahead for employment, do what dad or uncle Jed did and join the Army?

I think that’s what makes some of these fine, intricately decaled cars do to us subliminally, so amazing. Drawing us into all kinds of involuntary attractions for products and services we may or may not need. I just hope the end result is good for these young men and women and don’t get confused with corporate greed or military staffing levels that may not be the best for America’s young.

Dale Dodge Jr. Has a Name With a NASCAR Ring To It

This dudes name caught my attention as someone we may hear from down the road. He left a comment to an earlier post with a link to his site. Thought we would get his name out there and see what happens. So if your thinking of commenting here at ZuDfunck it can pay off. Give Dale Dodge Jr a ride.

Carl Edwards opens March with Maybes

Yesterday's Race at Vegas opens up a series of Maybes:

Maybe Roush racing has met and exceeded the challenges with making their Car of Today program a success

Maybe Carl Edwards has been hanging out too long with WWE superstar John Cena and just had to have a Vegas winner championship belt to compete with Cena’s various Champ is Here belts

Maybe that camera man was asked to interfere with the tire changer and as a result not make Cena, I mean Carl, make a penalty lap

Maybe it just stinks and ZuD doesn’t care for Carl Edwards 'cause every time he wins and does that annoying back flip I am concerned he’s gonna mess up and land on his Big Head.

Don’t know what the usual winner of Atlanta is but let's hope it’s not a favorable track for Roush Racing.