NASCAR always makes my redneck/good ol’ boy side shine. In that spirit, here are two emails/letters I’ve written concerning Tony Stewart:
ONE:
The Home Depot
Attention: Consumer Affairs
2455 Paces Ferry Road
Atlanta, GA 30339
6 September, 2002
To Whom It May Concern:
Enough is enough! After hearing about Tony Stewart’s shenanigans with the reporter earlier this year, I was ready to return some stuff I bought at Home Depot. After reading that Tony Stewart assaulted a woman in Bristol, TN, I am no longer shopping at Home Depot and will ask all my friends and family to refrain from shopping at your stores, too.
I received gift certificates for Home Depot for my birthday. I will be going to the local store to cash them out rather than buy another item at Home Depot.
I am also sending this note in a letter to the corporate office in Atlanta, GA.
Sincerely,
Richard L Hill, II
Attachment: Yahoo! Sports story: Stewart accused of shoving Tennessee fan (see article at bottom of this blog entry)
===================================================================================
TWO:
NASCAR
PO Box 2875
Daytona Beach, FL 32120
18 February 2008
NASCAR Executives/Marketing:
One word to describe the Daytona 500 (and possibly the rest of this season) – boring. It used to be that my family would watch the Daytona 500 and call each other after the game to discuss it. Not this time. I don’t think anyone watched more than two or three minutes of the race.
There were no compelling stories. All the same old stories are there – the rough-and-tumble Tony Stewart types versus the corporate clean-boy Ryan Newman types – and the racing itself is completely uninteresting. I’d rather go watch the IndyCar race in Charlotte where a bunch of buzzing bees spin around in a bowl than watch another NASCAR race with the cars of yesterday…oops, I mean the marketing-hyped CoT.
Lately, my family has become interested in the races at venues like Mid-Ohio, Road Atlanta and Barber Motorsports Park. At least there you can see modern cars/bikes and real race drivers up close. Maybe you folks in NASCAR can learn a thing or two from them – the days of watching billboards go round-and-round in a circle are over. Time for mixed series racing, where fast cars (or bikes) have to dodge slow cars on the track, just like in real life where the Corvettes have to dodge Chevettes, taking left and righthand turns in the process.
Best of luck with the new Sprint and Nationwide series – the names of the series are as uninspiring as the drivers and racing on the track.
Sincerely,
Rick Hill
======================================================================================
NASCAR driver Tony Stewart has been accused of shoving a female fan following a race in Tennessee last month.
The unidentified woman was in the pit area at Bristol Motor Speedway watching the Sharpie 500 Winston Cup race when she claims she was pushed by Stewart, who finished 24th.
“We had one officer witness it,” Sullivan County Sheriff Wayne Anderson said yesterday.
Stewart, who was in Richmond, Va., for tonight’s Monte Carlo 400, declined to comment through a spokesman.
Mike Arning, a spokesman for Stewart’s Home Depot-sponsored race team, said team owner Joe Gibbs was expected to arrive at Richmond International Raceway today and would meet with reporters then.
Arning said the sheriff’s department interviewed him and five others at the track yesterday, but declined to give any more details.
The woman was authorized to be in the pits, Anderson said. He added that he would “rather not say at this point” whether she was injured.
Stewart, 31, is on probation with both NASCAR and the Home Depot, the sponsor of his No. 20 Pontiac, for punching a photographer who tried to take his picture following the Brickyard 400 in Indianapolis on Aug 4.
Noteworthy
* Jimmie Johnson and Ryan Newman added a little bit of history to their impressive debut seasons last night, becoming the first rookie drivers to sweep a Winston Cup front row in the modern era.
Johnson earned his fourth pole of the season with a lap of 126.145 mph around the three-quarter-mile oval at Richmond International Raceway. He’ll start the Monte Carlo 400 with Newman on his outside. Newman and Johnson are the first rookie front row in the series since 1972.
* Bobby Hamilton will be out at least 3 weeks after breaking his left wrist and right shoulder in a crash Thursday night at Richmond. Greg Biffle will drive the Andy Petree-owned Chevrolet in Hamilton’s place. *
treetrunkdings 