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NASCAR Sprint-Cup Series
JENSEN: Let’s Up The Ante
It's time for someone to challenge both the Indy 500 and the Coca-Cola 600...
Tom Jensen  |  Posted May 31, 2010   Charlotte, NC
Dario Franchitti (Right) of Scotland celebrates with team owner Chip Ganassi (Left) in victory lane after winning the IZOD IndyCar Series 94th running of the Indianapolis 500. (Photo: Getty Images)
Congratulations to team owner Chip Ganassi for winning the Daytona 500 and the Indianapolis 500 in the same season, something that’s never been done before.

In fact, on Sunday Ganassi came up just one position short of being the winning car owner in both the Indy 500 and Coca-Cola 600, with Dario Franchitti winning the 500 and Jamie McMurray finishing second in the 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway.

Now let’s up the ante.

A couple of weeks ago, CMS owner Bruton Smith spilled the beans that he and Izod IndyCar CEO Randy Bernard were working on a plan to offer $20 million to any driver who could win the Indy 500 and the Coca-Cola 600 on the same day.

Now, obviously a lot of things would have to happen to even make that possible — changes in start times, changes in schedules for the month of May to allow drivers to practice in both types of cars, etc. It would take a lot of work to make it a reality, but it’s at least conceivable.

And after watching the Indy 500 and the Coca-Cola 600, it should be screamingly obvious to both NASCAR and the IndyCar Series that anything done to collaboratively raise the visibility of the two series helps everyone in both camps.

One of the most heroic drives I’ve ever witnesses was watching Tony Stewart score top-10s at Indy (ninth) and the Coca-Cola 600 (fourth) in the same day in 1999, his rookie year in the Cup Series. That 600 was run on a bitterly hot and sticky night, and after the race was concluded, Stewart pulled onto pit road and promptly passed out.

Out of nowhere, Dale Earnhardt walked up to the car, pulled Stewart out, set him down and leaned over him. Earnhardt reached down, lightly slapped Stewart on the side of the face, whispered “Had enough?” in his ear and then vanished like John Wayne in the classic 1956 John Ford movie, “The Searchers.”

If you knew anything about Earnhardt and what he stood for, that gesture was his way of acknowledging that Stewart had done something big, and indeed he had. What Stewart accomplished on that day took immense talent, brass balls and the ability to imagine the possible — three traits we as a nation admire and embrace.

It’s been disappointing in recent weeks to hear from Sprint Cup drivers about why it would be so difficult to try to do this now. Hellfire, people, have some vision.
Chip Ganassi (Left) and Jamie McMurray (Right) celebrate in victory lane after the 2010 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Daytona 500. (Photo: LAT Photographic)

The fact that Ganassi was the winning car owner in the Daytona 500 and the Indy 500 in the same year is making national headlines. Imagine the incredible press if someone actually won both races on the same day. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: If a driver could somehow defy the odds and win both races in the same day, it would be the biggest story in the history of American motorsports.

Someone needs to make this happen. The sooner the better.

Think about it: Memorial Day is all about honoring heroes and the American way of life. And that way of life is dreaming the big dream, climbing the tallest mountains and achieving the types of things others can’t even conceive of doing because they lack the vision and the courage.

So let’s challenge racers and sanctioning bodies in both camps to dream the big dream and make it possible — and lucrative — to do the Indy-Coca-Cola 600 double again.

Will it be easy? No.

Will everyone want to do it? Of course not.

But think about seeing Montoya, Hornish, Stewart, Gordon and one or more of the Busch brothers in the Indy 500, with Franchitti, Dixon, Castroneves, Andretti and Patrick in the Coke 600.

Think about what that would do to drive ticket sales and TV ratings.

Think about what it would do for NASCAR and the IZOD IndyCar Series.

And most of all, think about how dang cool it would be to witness.

It’s time, America. It’s time.

Tom Jensen is the Editor in Chief of SPEEDtv.com, Senior NASCAR Editor at RACER and a contributing Editor for TruckSeries.com. You can follow him online at twitter.com/tomjensen100 and e-mail him at Jensen is the author of “Cheating: The Bad Things Good NASCAR Nextel Cup Racers Do In Pursuit of Speed,” and has appeared on numerous television and radio shows. Jensen is the past President of the National Motorsports Press Association and an NMPA Writer of the Year.

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