| | Asscociated Press
DARLINGTON, S.C.-- Feuding is back in NASCAR and Darlington Raceway President Jim Hunter couldn't be happier.
Less than two weeks before the Southern 500, Hunter expects to get a big bump from the sudden feud between Tony Stewart and Jeff Gordon, who tangled on the track at Watkins Glen and then in the garage.
"Those two poured some jalapeno sauce on the vanilla ice cream" of NASCAR's Winston Cup series, Hunter said Wednesday.
Stewart and Gordon bumped each other on the third lap of the Global Crossing at the Glen. Then shouted at each other after the race.
"I'll slam you into the wall the first chance I get," Gordon
yelled.
"Come over here and we'll talk about it," Stewart shouted back as crewmen stood between the drivers. "All I'm saying, Jeff, is make up your mind."
No swings were exchanged.
And Hunter, who attended the race, said his smile grew from ear to ear.
"You've got to control the bammin' and frammin'," he said. "But this is what NASCAR is all about. This is why it became so popular."
Hunter said it was the first time he could remember that two of
NASCAR's younger stars lit out for each other.
Back when Hunter was a young racing journalist in the 1960s, all you had were feuds. Richard Petty and Bobby Allison would bump on a weekly basis. Cale Yarborough nicknamed Darrell Waltrip "Jaws" in one of the sports' more famous dustups.
Dale Earnhardt had feuded with, well, everybody, Hunter said.
Stewart is as competitive as Earnhardt, Hunter said, and makes his presence felt at any time. That can grate on drivers, like Gordon, who feel Stewart is out of line. The feud hits Brooklyn, Mich., and Bristol, Tenn., before arriving for the Southern 500 on Sept. 3.
Hunter knows that these entanglements can stretch over time and bring the spotlight to South Carolina's superspeedway, which celebrates the race's 50th anniversary this Labor Day weekend.
In 1995, Darlington got a boost when Rusty Wallace bounced a water bottle off Earnhardt's head at the Bristol race. Last year, after Earnhardt bumped Terry Labonte out of the lead and into Bristol's wall, Darlington sold 6,000 extra tickets for its race a week later.
"That's what people want to see," Yarborough said from his Florence home. "NASCAR's done a little too much hand-slapping recently."
Most drivers usually forgive, if not forget, such spats.
When drivers descended on Earnhardt's Darlington trailer at last year's Southern 500, Wallace walked by quickly and said in a child's sing-song voice, "Dirty driver, dirty driver."
Earnhardt laughed.
Hunter said next week the track is unveiling a promotion, sponsored by the Pepsi bottlers in the Carolinas, where fans can buy six Southern 500 tickets and get six tickets to Rockingham's Pop Secret 400 on Oct. 22.
In recent years, Yarborough and Hunter agreed, the sport sometimes has dissolved into a mix of corporate appearances and canned comments. "You can almost know what the crew chiefs and drivers are going to say before they say it," said Yarborough, who has won five Southern 500s among his 83 Winston Cup victories.
Hunter said he thinks his remaining tickets will be snapped up to see if Stewart and Gordon, who won an unprecedented four-straight Southern 500s from 1995-98, will tussle again.
What Gordon and Stewart did "was spontaneous. It's drama, and has rehumanized NASCAR for some people," Hunter said. "It's good for the sport."
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