By Carol Einarsson

CHEERS to my recording of the race starting with the last minute of NASCAR This Morning, and Jimmy Spencer running with commentary from Kenny Wallace.

JEERS to the way Jimmie Johnson says the word “shootout”, and it sounding like he just said an expensive word. Twice!

CHEERS to Tony, “They want war, they got it…”

JEERS to Blondie acting like the news is about him.

CHEERS to the Hendrick highlight film including Brooke… twice.

CHEERS to remembering Scott Lathram in addition to the Hendrick family.

CHEERS to Denny Hamlin looking like a kid.

CHEERS to Mark Martin, “We can still win this thing...” I know I can, I know I can!!

CHEERS to showing Rusty in black and gold!

CHEERS to showing Rusty in BIG HAIR!!

CHEERS to that one picture of Rusty and a mustached Mark Martin. When we were young…

CHEERS to Rusty admitting his mellowness and his tendency to tear.

CHEERS to no boos for Rusty. Yeah, that must mean it’s time to retire. I think that should be the guage. When a guy that’s spent years being booed finds himself basking in CHEERS, well… it must be time.

JEERS to booing for Ricky Rudd? What was that all about?

CHEERS to Wally with a wrestler in the car? I wonder how they got that guy IN that space. Did he have to bring that belt?

CHEERS to replaying the Marty Snider distraction. Where was I when that happened??? Was that Dover? I never saw that!

CHEERS to Marty heavy enough that guys can’t just fling him around with ease.

CHEERS to the way the cars start, backed up to the wall.

JEERS to showing a close up of Brian Vickers as we were praying for the families of those involved in the tragedy last year.

JEERS to Jamie O’Neal who seemed put a little too much “yeah yeah” in the middle of our anthem.

JEERS to a certain driver’s ability to fall in and out of love as often as most folks change the oil in their car. Most folks, not all folks.

CHEERS to Wally’s right elbow. We like that kind of illustration.

CHEERS to calling pit road “an adventure”. That can’t be good.

CHEERS to “other Subway representatives”. At least it wasn’t Jared again.

CHEERS to Kyle Petty starting in row seven!

JEERS to mentioning that Stanton Barrett was going to have to start in the rear because of an engine change. He qualified 42nd!!

JEERS to Chad Knaus thinking that angering Tony would be a good thing for his own driver. Seems to me an angry Tony is a lot more likely to win.

CHEERS to Wally and the pit road official, “We’ll see how brave he is when it’s green.” Yeah, my bet is he’ll be tucked nicely behind that wall with his little flag.

CHEERS to Ricky Rudd taking the lead, if only for three laps.

CHEERS to Roger taking things into his own hands, but wouldn’t you think he could at least call his two drivers together rather than having to go from one shop to the other?

CHEERS to a plan to do the opposite of the leaders.

JEERS to Marty calling the cars in front of Mark Martin “lapped traffic”. If Mark started in the back and isn’t yet lapped himself, how can all those cars in front of Mark be lapped?

JEERS to calling that “a close call” for Rusty. Looked a whole lot more like a close call for Wimmer than anyone else.

JEERS to Mike Wallace being the victim. That’s not like Mark Martin. Hmm…

CHEERS to Michael Waltrip, race leader!

CHEERS to Benny trying to circle Tony with an arrow.

JEERS to pit road speed just 30 miles an hour? Good grief. And good luck to Rusty not speeding.

JEERS to Kasey Kahne hitting Mike Wallace who then hit Michael Waltrip. I’m tellin’ ya, that boy hits someone every single week.

CHEERS to Greg Biffle, lucky dog!

JEERS to another caution, and this one for debris. Excuse me, but didn’t they just HAVE a caution, and isn’t the whole purpose of the yellow flag to give the track workers time to clean up the track after a wreck? What did they spend that last caution doing if not cleaning up the track?! And it’s not even like it’s a BIG track.

JEERS to my local cable (Cox) putting a local commercial over a Victory Junction Gang Camp commercial.

JEERS to a rear bumper cover hanging off of Denny Hamlin. That’s just not right. Minding his business and someone ELSE hits him? I wonder if they’re going to put yellow tape on the inside. Maybe they should put the yellow tape on the guy that hit him.

CHEERS to Wally calling Mike Wallace’s day “eventful”.

JEERS to the 08 having any contact with Elliott Sadler. At least it was the 08 in the pits and not the 38.

CHEERS to Ken Schrader leading the race!! And not just one lap, either! How come TV doesn’t just keep the camera on the leader THIS time??

JEERS to “When we come back, we’ll take you through the field!” Yeah, you said that LAST time, but maybe because Schrader and his other non-pitting friends were leading, you scrubbed that idea, eh?

CHEERS to Petty cars driving together, especially with Kyle being the lead car in the duo.

CHEERS to Marty trying to pass it to Pat Tryson.

JEERS to that constant hum of the race coming to a screeching halt.

JEERS to what looked like a blown right front tire on Bliss’ car causing the whole melee that lifted Sterling off the track and wrecked Rudd, too.

CHEERS to Michael learning from Schrader, and not pitting so he could lead a few laps. Not as many as Kenny, but still some.

JEERS to that blown right front not being really a blown right front, but rather a car with a 10 on the side of it.

CHEERS to Wally now wondering if there’s been any incidents today that Mike Wallace has missed.

CHEERS to the pink car and the reason that it’s pink, too, but instead of that pale pink, I wish they’d use a bright vibrant hot pink instead so the 41 car didn’t just look like it was washed in hot water.

CHEERS to the way Michael Waltrip whipped that 15 car around with attitude. Oh, I think Kurt Busch is about to hear from Mike in just a moment.

CHEERS to Elliott, lucky dog!

CHEERS to the State Farm commercial that asks the question “Who has more drivers than the other three combined?” and me in a commercial daze reading the words and thinking, “Jack Roush, of course…”

CHEERS to penalizing Kurt Busch! Ba ha ha ha ha!!! And then he got the stop sign, too!! We love justice!! (All this before he ever gets to see Michael Waltrip back on the track.)

CHEERS to “There’s just not that much happiness here.”

CHEERS to Denny Hamlin, lucky dog!! That makes up for his unlucky dogness earlier.

JEERS to three wide insanity in a whole new way. That 08 car needs to just accept his field-fillerness and go home now.

CHEERS to Kyle Petty up to tenth place, gaining another nine spots since the last “through the field”.

CHEERS to feeling “pops” in the shifter knob. That’s kinda like last week when I felt “scratchy” in my gas pedal. Car care tip of the week… don’t treat “scratchy” by just putting oil in. It can result in having too much oil in your car and plumes of blue smoke behind you. Not that I’d know that first hand or anything.

CHEERS to not hitting the wall, but just getting a good close look at it. But where’d they get that red tape? I think they ought to have a whole truck load of that tape in Petty Blue.

CHEERS to watching four different pit stops and seeing each jackman do a different thing with the removed tires.

JEERS to throwing the green when Hermie is stopped still on the start/finish line. What was that about?

JEERS to now seeing Hermie’s brother sitting pretty close to the same spot. Is there some kind of Sadler magnet there? One would think those boys would have better luck than this in Virginia.

CHEERS to Matt Kenseth’s form of call waiting on his radio: “Hang on, I’m busy!”

JEERS to a slow caution, with Hamilton going to the garage, smoke all over the track, and a slow 41, and then finally we hear the yellow flag is out.

JEERS to Benny’s suggestion that NASCAR limit the number of cars on pit road. How ‘bout instead of that, we have crew chiefs spot for their driver to ensure nobody hits anyone else.

JEERS to missing an entire green flag run while we were away at commercial. It was yellow when we left and yellow AGAIN when we got back.

CHEERS to Biffle leading a lap! Not bad for a guy that was the lucky dog not too long ago.

JEERS to all the torture that poor 15 car is enduring. This time it was Cousin Carl. But at least now Mike’s car is perfect. Must’ve been the curb.

CHEERS to the tell-tale look of a Martinsville car.

JEERS to “That’s a replay, but not a replay of the other replay.”

CHEERS to Denny Hamlin being from Virginia, something I didn’t know until Matt Yocum told us so.

JEERS to smoke coming out of the 43. I wonder if there’s too much oil in it. Not that I’d know about that sorta thing.

JEERS to spending twenty minutes watching the 20 and the 48 bumper to bumper with JJ trying to pass Tony, and then missing the pass while we’re looking at the 99 getting lapped.

JEERS to nobody but me noticing that Mark Martin’s left front tire isn’t even turning, even though his right front is. And fire? Yikes!!

CHEERS to pit stops giving Tony a chance to jump back out front.

JEERS to a mouth full of jet blower dust for Allen. Cough, cough!

CHEERS to Bobby Labonte keeping cool while two guys in front of him fight over a dog.

JEERS to 31 laps down and in 34th as they run. But at least Mark’s back on the track. I don’t think Talladega wrecked his chances, but this one might have.

CHEERS to Caution out!!

JEERS to Kyle Busch spinning out Matt Kenseth. We don’t know who spoke on the radio to slow Kenseth’s retaliation chase, but we’re glad for the voice that did.

JEERS to Rusty losing fifteen spots in an argument with the wall.

CHEERS to Tony in second!! Maybe the only reason he got into the back of the 48 is because the 20 was clearly faster. Either that or he was angry.

CHEERS to Caution out!! Again!!

CHEERS to Wally wondering who’s in fourth, because he might well win if the top three have an “issue”.

JEERS to Blondie who,……too often,…..speaks….. like Bill….. Shatner.

CHEERS to Jeff Gordon who coasted to the front and stayed there thanks, in part, to two guys battling so long for second.

JEERS to the fake burnout, accomplished only by pushing one’s nose up against the wall.

JEERS to whatever that gigantic thing was placed atop the 24 car.

CHEERS to backwards hats.

JEERS to booing Jeff Gordon, as much as I would have liked to see someone else win, because you just shouldn’t boo a guy that wins on the anniversary of such loss for his team.

CHEERS to how much taller Gordon’s crew chief is than he is.

CHEERS to Michael Waltrip managing to get mentioned in Victory Lane.

JEERS to Jimmie Johnson having his hat backwards just for the Victory Lane photo op, but showing his insincerity by turning it back around as soon as he left.

CHEERS to Tony understanding why Harvick has wanted to kill Biffle so many times. “He’s a nice guy, I like him, but if he came over here, I’m afraid I’d have to strangle him right now.”

CHEERS to Biffle wanting a mere six and a half feet.

CHEERS, I guess, to Rusty Wallace and Mark Martin being separated in the chase by just four points.

CHEERS to Bobby Labonte finishing fourth!

JEERS to no post race interview with Denny Hamlin who started fifth his first time out to Martinsville, and he even lost a bumper cover, went a lap down, and got the lucky dog all before finishing eighth! I wonder if “tryouts” for the 11 car are over, now.

JEERS to sadness finding Rusty. An amazing day that might have found him out front if not for craziness happening on a restart. It’s hard seeing a guy sad when you’ve seen him so often full of fire.

CHEERS to Kevin Harvick, starting 29th and finishing 15th. He’s without his crew chief, and no doubt fighting to concentrate on the race rather than his family, but he still turned in a fine finish.

CHEERS to Bobby Hamilton, Jr. NOT getting passed six times an hour.

CHEERS to Stanton Barrett not losing a spot all day.

CHEERS to Mike Wallace pulling off a 35th place finish despite being involved in nearly every wreck of the day.

and finally,

CHEERS to Ken Schrader and Kyle Petty finishing 13th and 14th! So often my assistant has asked me if I think Kyle Petty will ever win again. Sadly, I don’t answer with very much hope. But despite all those kids on the track these days, and all the new fans in the sport that don’t even know why we’re rooting for Kyle Petty, things are turning around over there, and hope seems to come more easily these days.