Gordon owns up, admits 'Dega lobbying
Friday, Nov. 06, 2009
FORT WORTH, Texas – Jeff Gordon on Friday admitted he was one of the Sprint Cup drivers who approached NASCAR officials last weekend and urged them to prohibit bump-drafting in the corners at Talladega (Ala.) Superspeedway.
Many fans – and some of the drivers who complained to NASCAR about bump-drafting – have blamed the eleventh-hour prohibition for a perceived lack of competitive racing. The race was the seventh of 10 that will determine the championship.
"I was one of them," Gordon said at Texas Motor Speedway. "Bump-drafting through the corners is ridiculous. I don't think that had anything to do with the race you saw last week.
"If anything, I think it's what allowed 30-plus cars to be on the lead lap with 30 (laps) to go, which sometimes only makes the big wreck even bigger."
Gordon said NASCAR's crackdown on bump-drafting through the corners was the reason more cars made it to the finish.
"I thought that was a big positive. If you have a car that you can bump-draft the way that car does, that's the issue. It's not telling us what we can and can't do," the four-time champion said.
"We need to get out there and work hard to swap positions. Track position is so important in our series – and then they create a car that it's not important, that you can kind of get up (front) whenever you want.
"Eventually you're going to have guys that say, 'We got 500 miles to go, we're just going to sit here and ride.' "
The Charlotte Observer is pleased to be able to offer its users the opportunity to make comments and hold conversations online. However, the interactive nature of the internet makes it impracticable for our staff to monitor each and every posting.
Since charlotteobserver.com does not control user submitted statements, we cannot promise that readers will not occasionally find offensive or inaccurate comments posted on our website. In addition, we remind anyone interested in making an online comment that responsibility for statements posted lies with the person submitting the comment, not The Charlotte Observer.
If you find a comment offensive, clicking on the exclamation icon will flag the comment for review by the administrators, we are counting on the good judgment of all our readers to help us.
