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  • Cole Whitt Is Just Being Cole Whitt

    Cole Whitt Is Just Being Cole Whitt

    On the heels of the induction of the second class of the NASCAR Hall of Fame, young up and coming driver Cole Whitt is just taking it all in and learning from the masters of the sport.

    [media-credit name=”Photo credit: redbullusa.com” align=”alignright” width=”225″][/media-credit]But most of all, the soon to be twenty year old rookie who is now leading the point standings in the Camping World Truck Series is forging his own path. And yes, he is just being Cole Whitt.

    “Anyone that is going to be inducted in the Hall of Fame is going to be someone that I look up to for sure,” Whitt said. “I look up to all of them.”

    “But at the end of the day, you have to have your own style and your own way of doing things,” Whitt continued. “I’m really just pushing my own road and doing things the way I need to do them for myself.”

    “Cole Whitt is going to be who Cole Whitt is.”

    Right now Cole Whitt is currently the youngest points leader ever in the Truck Series. After his second consecutive top-three finish, the driver of the No. 60 Red Bull/ Fuel Doctor race truck leads veteran Johnny Sauter by a mere point.

    “It’s pretty amazing to think we did it, especially where the team has come from the beginning of the year,” Whitt said. “We really didn’t have that great of a Daytona outing but the team really turned things around.”

    “To come this far into the season and already grab the points lead, it’s been pretty cool,” Whitt said. “The team has really come together and things are clicking really well. It’s awesome to see this team come as far as we have.”

    While Cole Whitt preaches just being who he is, the young driver also credits his success solely with his race team. For him, the team is his main motivating source.

    “I think it’s just a matter of having a lot of good people,” Whitt said. “We’re not a big team, which makes it tough. But at the same time it’s easy to keep everyone on the same page.”

    “I try to keep the guys really motivated,” Whitt continued. “I’m at the shop every day and I try to put in as many hours as they do and work hard with them.”

    “I think the main thing is trying to keep everyone having fun,” Whitt said. “At the same time, we care about it a lot. When we don’t run good, we’re upset. But at the same time, we push each other to be better.”

    Whitt realizes that his team, with owner Stacy Compton, is one of those small team ‘Davids’ fighting some of the ‘Goliaths’ of the sport.

    “Stacy’s team has never been one of the biggest teams or one of the teams that is looked to as the one to beat but we’re trying to be that team,” Whitt said. “When everyone shows up at the track, we want them to say ‘We want to beat that team.’

    Whitt knows that it is just a matter of time until he and his team win a race this season. He currently is the only Truck Series driver to complete all 1,134 laps for the season, with five top-10s, finishing no lower than 14th to date.

    “So far, we haven’t really been the team to win races but we’ve been so consistent, driving up front,” Whitt said. “I think that win is just really going to come as long as we keep running as good as we have.”

    Whitt’s success in the Truck Series has also caught the eyes of others in the sport. He recently was offered the chance to run for Pastrana-Waltrip Racing in their No. 99 Nationwide car at Charlotte Motor Speedway on Memorial Day weekend.

    “It came together pretty quick,” Whitt said. “Jay Frye (Red Bull Racing) had been talking to me before about doing some Nationwide stuff and I just wasn’t really sure where it was going to go from there. He called me up and asked if I wanted to do this one weekend deal.”

    “I’m really excited to run for Pastrana-Waltrip Racing and give that 99 car a good run,” Whitt continued. “I’m excited more than anything to go back to a track that I’ve already been on and made laps on where it’s a little more familiar.”

    Whitt is also excited to celebrate the Memorial Day holiday at the race track as well as at home, a real treat for any professional stock car driver.

    “More than anything, I’m looking forward to getting into that Nationwide car,” Whitt said. “That’s kind of like my celebration I guess you could say.”

    “I’m going to hang out around the house more than anything,” Whitt continued. “The best part about Charlotte is sleeping in your own bed.”

    While Whitt could not be more excited to take on the new Nationwide ride, he is realistic about his expectations. And that is just another way that the young driver is being true to himself.

    “I wouldn’t say I expect anything,” Whitt said. “At the beginning of the season, if you had asked me, I would have never thought we’d be leading the points.”

    “Would I have really thought it would be possible? Probably not,” Whitt continued. “But that’s cool. We pushed forward and we have a team that’s better than we expected to be.”

    “There’s so much to grasp and I’ve just been absorbing everything that’s been thrown at me,” Whitt said. “I’m so thankful for the chance to learn.”

  • Hard Cards Available at NASCAR Hall of Fame

    Hard Cards Available at NASCAR Hall of Fame

    Every race fan dreams of having a NASCAR hard card, providing full access to the garage area, the drivers, and all of the behind the scenes action at every NASCAR race.  While limited only to those involved full-time at the top levels of the sport, every fan can now get a hard card just by visiting the NASCAR Hall of Fame.

    [media-credit id=11 align=”alignright” width=”200″][/media-credit]Indeed, I got my very own hard card personalized upon entry to the HOF, located in Charlotte, North Carolina.  And I used it throughout the building, from the opening film about the history of the sport to participating in the myriad of interactive exhibits throughout the Hall.

    After hard carding my way into the Belk High Octane Theatre for a truly big screen NASCAR movie adventure, I used my card to wind my way onto Glory Road. Here, poised on a race track with several degrees of banking, were actual race cars, from the Hudson Hornet to Jimmie Johnson’s most recent championship No. 48.

    My hard card gave me access to go up onto the track and snap a picture of those race cars coming right at me, as well as access to try out the banking at Daytona, which I admit that I would have tumbled down without the hand rails to which I was holding on for dear life.

    With my hard card in tow, I next entered the Hall of Honor, featuring the five inaugural inductees into the Hall of Fame, Junior Johnson, Richard Petty, Bill France, Sr., Bill France, Jr. and Dale Earnhardt.  There was almost a hush that fell upon us as we entered that room and paid tribute to these jewels of the sport.

    I also did indeed get misty-eyed on seeing that famed black No. 3 car, complete with many mementos from the Intimidator’s days gone by and glory lost just ten years ago.

    After leaving the solemnity of the Hall of Honors, I took myself and my card and headed to the interactive exhibit area.  This was where the fun began as my hard card was my access to the accumulation of points, fueling the competition with others in everything from hoisting a gas can to removing those pesky lug nuts during a pit stop.

    One of the most interactive areas in the Hall was solely designed for children, focusing on educating the next generation of NASCAR fans.  The best part of that section was seeing the memorabilia from the childhoods of the likes of Jeff Gordon, Tony Stewart and Jimmie Johnson.  They were so cute as little boys, as well as just being a bit geeky too.

    Another interactive exhibit in this section allows the hard card holder to actually call a race.  Donning the head sets and the microphone, I suddenly discovered how difficult that actually was to do and have renewed respect and regard for the MRN, PRN, ESPN and all of those broadcast professionals who call the races for us each and every weekend.

    My favorite interactive exhibit was the race simulators, whereby you can race other fans sitting in actual race cars, driving like you stole it.  Yes, I do realize that this is all simulated but after five minutes, I was definitely working up a bit of a sweat trying to keep my car on the track and keep out of the way of all the others who were intent on either passing or wrecking me.

    I am pleased to report that, after a rather difficult start where I did indeed pass the pace car, resulting in a trip to pit road to serve my penalty, I got the hang of it and actually stayed out of harm’s way.  In fact, I finished first and then promptly ran over the official on my way to Victory Lane, a first or so they tell me at this exhibit.

    Waving my hard card, I admit that I immediately hurried on over to get my picture taken with the Sprint Cup.  And yes, I did hold up my index finger, striking the No. 1 pose, and yelling woo.  Unfortunately, thanks to my hard card, as well as my debit card, I have the pictures to prove it.

    My NASCAR Hall of Fame hard card took me inside a race team hauler, inside a race shop of days gone by, and right past the exhibit filled with various race trophies, from the Martinsville Granfather’s clock to Dover’s Miles the Monster.

    I was again moved to tears by the room honoring those lost in racing, including most recently NASCAR PR executive Jim Hunter, and moved to laughter by the staff person waving the yellow flag vociferously in the race flag display.

    My final hard card stop was to purchase my souvenir pictures from my visit, as well as some shopping in the Hall of Fame gift store.  Unfortunately, the big screen television there was showing the NFL play off game but I am sure that will change in just a few short weeks when the cars get back on the track in Daytona.

    So, got get your own hard card for a once in a lifetime NASCAR experience.  I will be keeping my card in a safe place in my wallet for the next time I make the trek to Charlotte and cannot wait to see what is next at the NASCAR Hall of Fame.

  • NASCAR Beginnings Featuring ‘Suitcase’ Jake Elder

    NASCAR Beginnings Featuring ‘Suitcase’ Jake Elder

    J. C. Elder only had a third grade education. He never learned to read and write but he was a natural born genius when it came to working on cars.

    Elder was a man of few words but he knew exactly what he wanted in a race car. If someone disagreed or questioned his decisions, more often than not, he would just pick up and leave. He soon became known throughout the racing community simply as “Suitcase.”

    Despite his cantankerous disposition, Elder was one of the most popular men in the garage. Some said he could just watch a car take a lap around the track and know what was wrong with it. People will put up with a lot for that kind of brilliance.

    “I have a problem getting people to understand how I want things done,” he once said. “Usually, I can get it done myself quicker than I can explain to them how I want it done.”

    Jake Elder began his NASCAR career as a fabricator for Richard Petty Enterprises around 1960.

    Jake came to work for us in Level Cross in the ‘60s, down from the Hickory area, and he was a fabricator,” Richard Petty said. “Jake was old school. There was no engineering; it was all off the cuff. He’d put something on the car and say, ‘OK, now it’s right. Here, you go drive it. And don’t come back in complaining to me, because I got the car fixed. You go learn how to drive it.’”

    He later went on to partner with the Holman-Moody Ford factory team. While there, Elder worked with Mario Andretti and led him to a 1967 victory of the Daytona 500.

    Elder also crew chiefed for David Pearson. Together they won 27 races and two championships in 1968 and 1969.

    He later helped Dale Earnhardt get his first Cup victory in 1979 at Bristol Motor Speedway. Earnhardt went on to win Rookie of the Year that season. Suitcase started out the 1980 season with Earnhardt but quit before the season was over. Even so, part of the credit for Earnhardt’s first Cup championship rightly belongs to Elder.

    His brief partnership with Earnhardt also produced one of the most colorful quotes in NASCAR history. After Earnhardt’s first win, Elder told the rookie, “Stick with me kid and we’ll have diamonds as big as horse turds.”

    Ironically it was Elder who left Earnhardt.

    Dale Earnhardt never forgot Elder. When jobs were scarce, Earnhardt hired Elder to crew chief for his Busch team.

    Elder helped mold the careers of some of NASCAR’s most legendary drivers including Darrell Waltrip, Fred Lorenzen, Terry Labonte, Fireball Roberts and Benny Parsons.

    During the 1970s and 1980s, he probably worked with almost every driver on the track, moving on whenever his mood or circumstances called for a change.

    Elder worked with Darrell Waltrip many times over the years and was with Waltrip for his first and last Cup victories.

    “He was my crew chief about 10 different times,” Waltrip said. “I fired him a lot, and he’d go on and work with Dale, or somebody else, and then he’d be back with me.

    “He helped me, he helped Dale Earnhardt, he helped Terry Labonte — every young driver that came along, Jake made winners out of them because he gave you a car and taught you what a car is supposed to feel like.”

    Jack Roush entered the Cup series as an owner in 1988 and describes Elder as having an almost supernatural ability to diagnose problems.

    “If you had a demon, if your team was beset by bad luck, he would bring his little bag of templates and stuff to check out a car with,” says Roush. “And he would go in and the guys would get out of his way, and he would make his adjustments, and when he was done, if there was a demon in there, he’d have it chased off.

    In the 1990s, more and more teams began using engineers and specialists. Jake Elder and his kind were becoming obsolete.

    But at one time, Jake Elder was the man to call whenever someone had a problem that needed fixing.

    Jeff Hammond described Elder as unique.

    “Jake was into precision before we knew what precision was. Think about the people he worked with: Fireball Roberts, Dale Earnhardt, and David Pearson. He had a huge influence. A lot of the time, if people needed their car fixed, they called Jake Elder.  He wasn’t a people person and he was as rough as a corn cob, but if you got to know him, there wasn’t a better guy to know in that garage area. There is not another Jake Elder. That is one thing we do not have anymore.”

    Winston Kelley, the executive director of the NASCAR Hall of fame, called Elder “one of the true pioneers and classic personalities of our sport.”

    “One of my most vivid memories of Jake is asking him what happened to one of his meticulously prepared cars and Jake putting it so succinctly and simply in saying, ‘It blowed up.’”

    In 2006 “Suitcase Jake” Elder suffered a stroke and his health slowly began to deteriorate. He battled dementia and ended up in an assisted living facility in Statesville, North Carolina. On February 24, 2010, Jake Elder passed away.

    Some called him a miracle worker. Others said he had a magic touch. One thing is certain. Suitcase Jake Elder was one of a kind and his influence on NASCAR should never be forgotten.

    Achievements:

    1968 Cup Championship with David Pearson

    1969 Cup Championship with David Pearson

    1980 Cup Championship with Dale Earnhardt

    Quotes courtesy of The Associated Press, Mike Hembree, Speed TV, Sports Illustrated, Scene Daily and NASCAR.