Bench Racing with Steve and Charlie

Four will go and the rest go home

Boris Said is an ON PIT ROW favorite. He said yesterday that he’s either going to get his 7 Eleven - Spurpie - No Fear Racing Fusion into the Daytona 500 or it’s going home in a basket. Boris will be racing with six other go-or-go homers for two spots in NASCAR’s Super Bowl.

Warren Wallace’s other second cousin, Kenny Wallace, Red Bull twins  Brian Vickers andA J Allmendinger, Awesome Bill Elliott, Daytona winner Sterling Marlin and Carl Long are the competition for Boris in race number one of the Gatorade Dual 150′s.

The wild card in that race is Kurt Busch.  Busch’s owner’s points were transferred to teammate Sam Hornish ......

For the rest of this post go to the new home of the Bench Racing blog here.  Thanks. Oh, please change your bookmarks or maybe subscribe to our feed.

Super commercials? Bah -where’s Warren Wallace?

We've moved the home of Bench Racing with Steve and Charlie to the new OnPitRow.com site.  We'll continue to post over here for awhile, but please check out the new site and change your bookmarks. Thanks.

I think that the Super Bowl was as much about the commercials as it is the football game for most non-east coasters.

That’s the way it has been around the day job for me today.  Sure, there was some talk about a pretty great game, along with griping about the fact that  all we’ll hear from the talking sports-heads for the next eight months is how great the New York Football Giants are.  As if the Yankees-Red Sox bias wasn’t enough to turn Middle-American stomachs.

That part didn’t really last too long though.  After about an hour of game talk the topic switched totally to the commercials.  You know….

“Which one was you favorite?  That dancing gecko - Thriller spot was hilarious.  No, no, the caveman spot with the bottle-opener did it for me…”

Nobody does geckos and cavemen better than the Geico people.  Their Warren,  or is Lauren Wallace commercials are still my favorites.  There was no sign of Warren  during the Super Bowl, but I have to believe Geico has some new adventures of Warren Wallace in store for us over the next couple weeks - I hope.

In fact the only NASCAR spot that I saw was the one by Fox for their Daytona 500 broadcast, and it was pretty cool.  I guess there was a Dale Junior Amp Energy Drink commercial, but I missed it just like Bob.  You can check it out at the Ranting and Raving blog.

Where’s Warren?

Live Blog - NASCAR Awards Show

Watching NASCAR's year end awards banquet and show from the Waldorf in New York City is, to me, a painful experience.  But doing what I do, I feel compelled to watch it. That's kind of funny actually because I don't always feel compelled to watch the races.  Anyway, since I have to do this, I was hoping that some of you would join me in my pain. 

Steve and our producer/photographer Beth Anne have promised - under threat of me making their email addresses public on MySpace - to show up at some point and I have dropped pleading hints around the NASCAR blogosphere as well. 

So with the help of this great Cover it Live software we'll try our best to resurrect Joel, Tom Servo, Betsy and Crow of Mystery Science Theatre 3000 fame and totally de-construct NASCAR's most ludicrous night.

Wace Weather with Warren Wallace - an ON PIT ROW exclusive

Bench Racing Productions is proud to debut our new weather forecast feature for the NASCAR race weekends.  The Weather with Warren (or is it Lauren?) Wallace will be a regular feature of this space.  So let's get to the weather.

Charlie:    "Hey Warren, how's it going?"

Warren:     "It's Arizona.  It's hot."

Charlie:     "Yeah. I'll bet.  So I want to welcome you ON PIT ROW.  We're glad you could find the time in your busy schedule."

Lauren:    "Whatever. I heard that you've been trying to get my..uh...cousin Rusty on, too.  How's that workin' out?"

Charlie:     "Not so well. Thanks for asking.  How about that forecast for the Checker Auto Parts 500 ..."

The Kid:     "At Pheonix International Raceway.  Yeah, I know.  Like I said.  It's gonna be hot.  And Mike Wallace will be in the wall before it's over.  See ya next week."

Charlie:      "Uh, thanks Lauren.  Or is it Warren?"

Wallace had to work a tough room today

NASCAR fans are getting punchy about there passion these days if the group that I hung with today, during the Dickey's 500, is an indication.

I was with a bunch of friends fooling around with slot cars and watching the race from Texas Motor Speedway.  There is a sense of inevitability in this year's Chase to the last Nextel Cup.  Most of the people that I know group Jimmy Johnson and Jeff Gordon into and amalgam.  There is no separation between them unless you are a fan of one or the other.  There weren't any Johnson or Gordon fans in the group that I was with tonight. 

The Ford and Mopar fans have run up the white flag.  That's white flag as in surrender, not green, white, checker.  Tony Stewart's fans and the RCR hopefuls are looking to Daytona. 

So, since the race winner seemed to be inevitable - and it turned out to be so - the room got ugly.  And Rusty Wallace became the focus.

When Rusty made the comment;

"This race is going to finish in the dark."  Duh?

He was attacked like a T-bone in a piranha tank.  Rusty Wallace had a bad night in a basement in Toledo tonight.  Personally, I have enjoyed Wallace as a color analyst on the ABC broadcasts.   I have to admit though that today was not his finest performance.

Only thirty points separate Johnson and Gordon with two races to go in the 2007 championship and they are the last contenders.  If your job has to do with keeping the interest of the rest of NASCAR nation, you had better be on your game.

ON PIT ROW--your live, local look at NASCAR

More changes are in the works for ON PIT ROW--the radio show, which may necessitate changing that local only angle.

It was just announced this week that our long time home radio station, and flagship, WCWA-1230 in Toledo, OH will become the flagship station for the Toledo Mud Hens AAA baseball team.  With most of their games starting at 6:30 or 7:00 pm; when you figure in their pre-game show, it pretty much ruins our 5-7 pm live broadcast time.  We'll see what WCWA has to say during a meeting with us on Monday, November 5.  The other sports station in town is committed to the Detroit Tigers and a third quasi-sports/news station is set to air Cleveland Indians games.

ON PIT ROW may be looking to break out of the live on-air constraints of local radio.  We will be looking at a bunch of alternatives before the baseball season starts in April.  Including a new non-sports flagship; possibly a local country station that is part of the MRN and PRN networks.  Anyone from WCKY-FM looking at this?  There is also the live netcast streaming alternative, which we will look into and give over the air stations a chance to play the show whenever they want.

There have been plenty of changes in our show over the past few months and there are many more to come as we look to expand and grow Bench Racing Productions, which itself is a new venture for us. A couple of months ago we changed from a three person show to just Charlie and me.  So far reviews have been favorable.

Everyone always says the thing about a door closing and another opening.  We'll see if they are correct.  One thing is for sure Charlie and I have put too much time and energy into this deal for us not to keep going--no matter what. 

Stay tuned for updated news and hopefully an exciting announcement about a new, additional racing show from us coming soon.

PRN, MRN, Sirius--we'd be glad to sit down and talk about adding ON PIT ROW to your lineups. 

Picture credit: BethAnne Heisler - ON PIT ROW

Title sewn up for Gordon?

Just when everyone thought Jeff Gordon was out of fuel--he found enough to win at Lowe's Motor Speedway and lengthen his lead over the field of fellow Chasers.

Back to back wins at Lowe's and 'Dega has put Gordon in the cat-bird seat to win his fifth championship.  There were many pretenders at Lowe's on Saturday night but Gordon was the true class of the field after Ryan Newman hit the wall with a handful of laps remaining.

Kyle Busch had a shot late in the race after all but ignoring team owner Rick Hendrick's radio orders to not wreck each other at the conclusion of the race.  Rowdy went for the win and was pressuring Jeffy when Newman went to pass and met the wall.

So its on to Martinsville and a visit to the paper clip.  This is always fun.  Let the brake rotors start glowing!

The Buzz ON PIT ROW is:

Is Jeff Gordon having one of those "story book" seasons, where everything just goes right?

The Fast Lap this week asks:

1)  Was Tony just being Tony, or are non-Chase drivers "weapons" to be dealt with?

2) Dale Jarrett will retire after running 5 races in 2008.  Is that his farewell tour, or further abuse of the past champion's provisional rule?

3) Was NASCAR so desperate for a sponsor to take over the Busch Series that they sold out their first insurance company sponsor--Geico (and Loren/Warren/Lauren Wallace)?

4) Will Jimmy or Clint catch Jeffy?

Let us know how you feel about these questions, or anything else that happened while getting some home cooking at Lowe's.  If we like your comments, whether we agree or not, we may use them on the air during Tuesday's ON PIT ROW.  Leave us a comment on the blog or call the show--toll free at 1-877-502-8255 between 5-7pm edt on Tuesdays.

Photo: Streeter Lecka/Getty Images/NASCAR

Lloyd Moore ON PIT ROW

Steve and I are honored that for our Tuesday, October 9th show we will be joined by Lloyd Moore, NASCAR's and ARCA's oldest living driver.  Thanks to a heads up from Oldschool59  at NASCAR.com we have an interview set with Lloyd and I can't wait.

You can read all about Lloyd Moore and the early days of NASCAR and ARCA at the Legends of Nascar site.  It's fascinating stuff.  If no stations in your area carry ON PIT ROW -  why the hell not? - you can listen to the re-broadcast of the show Thursday night from 7-9pm edt on RaceTalkRadio.com.

Check out the ON PIT ROW Crew site in NASCAR.com's community area. The NASCAR.com community is a great place to meet up with other race fans.  Being somewhat social-site and HTML challenged myself, I find the simple interactivity of the NASCAR.com site a relief.  ON PIT ROW has already benefited from our involvement there, as this opportunity with Mr. Moore shows.

Nascar.com has a nice piece on Lloyd, and he has a champion in our new friend, Oldschool59.

Mike Wallace the next to drive the #88

Mike Wallace will drive the #88 Snickers Ford Fusion for Robert Yates Racing in the UAW Ford 500 at Talladega on Sunday. Mike takes the place of brother Kenny Wallace who had been filling the seat for injured Ricky Rudd. Got all that?

Mike spends most of his time these days competing in the NASCAR Grand National – still the Busch Series for a couple months. Wallace is sponsored by GEICO Insurance. The GEICO/Wallace team is a strong one, as Scene Daily noted….

GEICO has sponsored Mike Wallace for the last few seasons and is currently sponsoring him at Phoenix Racing. The company is known for its commercials featuring a "cousin" of Mike's.

The picture here is of Mike and cousin Warren Wallace - or is it Lauren – training for the three-wide chaos that is sure to be plentiful Sunday at “Dega.

The other news of the day was NASCAR’s announcement that Nationwide Insurance will become the title sponsor of the Grand National Series. Yikes! Nationwide, NASCAR and GEICO? Sprint, NASCAR and AT&T. Queue the sound of lawyers slobbering.

No worries, says the legal team that brought you the summer of 2007. GEICO has a two year “sunset clause” to shift their sponsor dollars to the Sprint Cup Series or possibly Craftsman Truck. Or maybe they just fade away.

I hope not. Those Lauren Wallace – GEICO commercials are some of the best television I’ve seen this year featuring a race car.

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All Wallace all the time redux

The news that Kenny Wallace will be driving the Robert Yates Racing #88 at Richmond International Raceway Saturday night is good.  Ricky Rudd's shoulder injury is a shame but not unfortunate.  For Herman, at least.  The Herminator is one of the few remaining, real personalities in the increasingly corporate world of NASCAR. 

At Indy for the Brickyard pre-race activities, Wallace seemed to be everywhere.  And everywhere his reception by fans was superstar-like.  Whether on the Speed stage for a Trackside appearance, on the music stage to intro a concert or at an appearance to race remote control cars against Richard Childress, Kenny's fans were loud and boisterous.  Just like him.  I hope he does well with the Yates opportunity.

Steve and I managed to catch up with Rusty Wallace in the garages at MIS a couple weeks back.  He had just finished interviewing Jeff Green for an ESPN segment.  He was mobbed by fans.  He is mobbed by fans always.  We grabbed an opportunity to ask him if he would be willing to be a guest ON PIT ROW.  You had to be there to appreciate this.  He was just like you see him on the air.  Smiling, appologizing for not having his schedule with him and writing down his assistant's cell number so that we could call and schedule with her.  Then he posed with us for  the picture you see here. 

Rusty was a guest on our show three years ago. He was terrific.  Around Toledo Speedway are many stories of his good nature and down-to-earth personality.  I think about this when watching him doing the color commentary on race day.  His in-booth performance is getting better each race.  You can tell he loves the sport.  It must have been tough covering his son Steve, driving a Rusty Wallace Racing car, when the young man struggled. 

Finally while we're on this world of Wallace - hey Geico.  How about a new Warren - or is it Lauren - Wallace commercial? 

Picture credit: Kenny and Rust : Beth Anne Heisler - ON PIT ROW