INDIANAPOLIS -- It took just three hours, 28 minutes and 29 seconds to undo the 15-year love affair between the Brickyard and NASCAR.Four-hundred miles of shredding tires and competition cautions left a lump in the throat of stock car racing at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in 2008, and a year later, the Sprint Cup Series has returned to the disaster zone facing a myriad of questions. Can stock cars produce a good show here? Should NASCAR be at the Brickyard? And, most importantly, do drivers still feel the awe and prestige of this legendary speedway?
Yes, yes and especially yes, drivers say.
"What makes this a great event -- whether it is stock cars or IndyCar or Formula One -- is the Indianapolis Motor Speedway's history in automobile racing," said Jeff Gordon, the winner of the inaugural Brickyard 400 in 1994 and three more since then.
The history aspect is something that fellow Chevrolet driver Jeff Burton agrees with.
"To me, the history makes this a great race," said Burton. "If you don't grasp the history and you don't understand how historic this race track is and the legacy of this race track, not just in the [United] States but around the world, you probably don't enjoy this race as much as somebody else does. To me, because of all of that I think it's an awesome race."
The history, and the what-could-have-been's are what stick with former driver, two-time Brickyard 400 champion and now ESPN commentator Dale Jarrett.
"It was the thrill of a lifetime to come here in 1994," said Jarrett of the inaugural running. "Really, it's hard to put in words what it meant."
Jarrett, despite being a two-time winner, experienced tremendous disappointment at IMS in 1997. While leading by 11 seconds in the middle of the race, the team tried to stretch the fuel during a green flag run to lead the race's halfway mark and secure the accompanying bonus money. The team succeeded, but ran out of fuel nearly immediately and coasted for nearly an entire lap.
When it was all said and done, Jarrett went from leading to being some four laps down while the team tried to get the car refired.
"All I could think about was how we just lost the Brickyard 400 and two million dollars in order to win $10,000," said Jarrett. "That was the toughest race I ever lost."
Speaking of that inaugural race, Tony Stewart readily admitted Friday that he initially hated the idea of stock cars coming to Indianapolis.
"I was a die-hard Indy Car guy at that time," said Stewart. "I was one of the people that was pretty upset around here about it. Once you saw the test tession and once you saw the first race here, you were like 'Hey, this really makes a lot of sense and it is a fit for here."
History alone, however, doesn't make a race significant or exciting to watch, or in the case of drivers, to compete in.
"I don't think that it's the best track that we race at for excitement and passing and things like that," said Indiana-native Ryan Newman. "It's the fastest and flattest track that we go to. That combination makes for more difficult racing and track position, and therefore, its more important."
Because history doesn't simply keep an event at its peak, Sunday's race will prove especially important. After the problems of a year ago, the attendance is likely to be lower in the mammoth IMS grandstands and the bruised feelings will need mended.
"No one walked out of here that wasn't disappointed," said Greg Stucker, Goodyear's director of race tire sales following a successful tire test at IMS in June. "And there hasn't been a day go by since that we haven't talked about the race. It's been our number-one priority for the last 11 months."
And that priority has paid off in the form of zero complaints or worries about the Goodyear rubber meeting the track for Sunday's Allstate 400 at the Brickyard. Practices and qualifying have gone off without a hitch, meaning that the prestige and glory that the match of Indianapolis with NASCAR seems to be heading back in the right direction.
Tires are expected to be a factor, but only because drivers and teams will now have them at their disposal to win.
"There are times when history outweighs other things and this race track is an example of that," said Burton.
