|
I think it is a demonstrable point that Dave Darland is absolutely nobody's idea of a dirty driver. I've always considered him one of the very cleanest drivers around. That being said, defensive driving does NOT come naturally to him, but neither is defensive driving a capital offense in racing. Sometimes what we from the stands see as defensive driving probably seems in a cockpit like doing everything possible (though NOT unethical) to win.
Oftentimes, disturbing a faster guy's momentum in the waning laps of a race is the difference between the win and a loss.(see: Kinser,Steve -for examples of this "art") Darland was going to remain up top until somebody showed him that there was some way that might be faster. That somebody was Steve Buckwalter with that "high-in-three-then-through-the-middle-in-four" tactic, which Darland immediately adopted with great success. Once he saw Clauson making those bottom lunges, he attempted a modified game plan.
Truth is, especially once that caution came out, there was No Way he was going to hold off Clauson. If the final yellow never came, and Dave and Bryan continued grappling for the low side, Buckwalter was poised to maybe smoke `em both. When Darland stunted the momentum of Whitt, he did so, in my opinion, with neither malice nor any particular notion that Cole was there. He was just trying to get a huge entry up top into three. That he cost Whitt a chance to overtake him, and opened the door for Kuhn to take Whitt, and very nearly Darland as well, is certainly true.
I'd reckon that the first that Darland knew Cole was even still in the race was when he got his car crowded by Whitt afterwards, while both of their levels were running VERY hot from the positions they each lost in the waning laps. And, of course, the default-mode of way,WAY too many of the younger guys in racing today is to crowd/ prod/ ram into a competitor who has given offense (see: Swindell,Kevin -for a master's level tutorial in how to mangle front, side and rear bars post-race).
I'm not used to seeing Whitt do the ramming, so he gets at least some slack for not being (to my experience) one of the major offenders in that area, but if you run into a guy after the race, you better be ready for him to ram back. And you'd better hope you're lucky enough to do it to a guy like Darland who is more likely to just say "***?" and leave it alone than a competitor who is Dave's size and is more inclined to throw down and rack.
Darland wasn't smooth in the last five laps, but neither do I think that he was dirty. He did give those looking to pass him quite the time figuring out how, though, but since when is that anything other than what Brad Sweet at Bloomington properly and (I thought) fairly-graciously called "Indiana Short Track Racing"?
|