Joey Logano, David Reutimann each need another win - one without rain
Joey Logano was destined to win at some point this season.
With his talent and his team, it was bound to happen. At Joe Gibbs Racing, he was destined to become the youngest driver ever to win a NASCAR Sprint Cup race.
And Logano, a Connecticut native, is ecstatic that his first career win came at his home track at New Hampshire Motor Speedway.
But Logano will also tell you that this is not how he wanted to win his first race – not with Lady Luck and Mother Nature both playing a huge factor.
Logano won Sunday when he stretched his fuel mileage and inherited the lead when all the leaders pitted. He then got the biggest break of his career – maybe the second biggest after signing with JGR – when it rained with him in the lead.
The rain washed out the final 28 laps of the race, and Logano was declared the winner.
It was a milestone moment and a special occasion for the rookie driver but also a little bittersweet.
“Obviously, it’s not the way you want to win your first race, in the rain, but 20 years down the road, when you look in the record books, no one will know the difference,” Logano said. “I’ll take them any way I can.”
David Reutimann knows how Logano feels. He won his first Cup race in May in the Coca-Cola 600 at Lowe’s Motor Speedway, but it, too, came when Mother Nature intervened, delivering rain just when he took the lead with pit strategy.
Both drivers are Sprint Cup winners, and no one can ever take that from them. But until they win again, their lone victories in the record books must include an asterisk, whether official or unofficial.
That is the trouble with rain-shortened and sometimes fuel-mileage races. They leave fans with a winner who didn’t really deserve to win.
Had Jeff Gordon, Kurt Busch, Jimmie Johnson, Tony Stewart or some other driver who challenged for the lead and ran in the top 10 all day been out front when it rained, then they would have qualified as a legitimate winner.
Logano did not.
Neither he nor Reutimann were serious contenders in the races they won. Reutimann had run in the top 10 at one point at Charlotte but was outside the top 10 when the leaders all pitted late in the Coca-Cola 600. He stayed out and then benefited when it rained.
He, like Logano, was declared the winner while sitting on pit road – not the way anyone really wants to win a race.
Gordon, Johnson, Busch, Stewart, Mark Martin and all of NASCAR’s top stars have all won races when they were out front when it rained. On that particular day, they were as likely to be lucky as good. But when you win dozens and dozens of races, some of them are bound to be lucky. When you’re good that often, the odds favor Lady Luck shining on you from time to time.
But you don’t want Lady Luck being the biggest factor in your first career victory, opening the door for people to question its legitimacy.
Logano and his team deserve credit for rallying from misfortune and putting themselves in position to win. After spinning with a flat tire, Logano was on a different pit sequence than everyone else. When the leaders had to pit under green, he was able to stretch his fuel and take the lead.
Fortunately, that’s about the time the clouds darkened, and the rain finally arrived. The only sun shining was on Logano, who lucked into his first career victory.
Crew chief Greg Zipadelli and his crew deserve tremendous credit for repairing the car, getting Logano on the lead lap and devising a strategy that put him in position to win.
Still, it was luck that led to the victory, making his first career win somewhat of a fluke, just as Reutimann’s was at Charlotte.
The 2009 season has produced three first-time winners, but two of them were a fluke. Rookie Brad Keselowski’s victory at Talladega was not. He raced to the front and then bumped Carl Edwards out of his way during a mad dash for the checkered flag, sending Edwards flying into the fence as Keselowski crossed the finish line.
Keselowski drove his car to the front, took matters into his own hands and capitalized to win the race.
Logano and Reutimann used pit strategy to inherit the lead and then were declared the winners when strange circumstances turned in their favor.
They are both still winners, and nothing can change that, but it is not the way either of them wanted to win his first Cup race.
Now they must go out and take matters into their own hands. Now they must both win again, outrunning the competition to legitimize themselves as Sprint Cup winners.
Jeff Owens is a writer for NASCAR Scene, which is published weekly, 46 weeks per year. Visit www.scenedaily.com for more information. © 2009 Street & Smith Sports Group
