Friends Fondly Remember Petty

Allen Lessels

Sunday, May 14, 2000 | 4:02 a.m.

LOUDON, N.H. - A red rose in a vase of yellow and purple flowers stood atop the short, white cement wall that runs along the outside of the track at New Hampshire International Speedway.

The flowers were not far from the entrance to Turn 3 and the spot where Adam Petty, the 19-year-old member of auto racing's most grand family, crashed and died from head trauma in practice Friday.

Jeff Purvis smacked the wall early in Saturday's Busch 200 Grand National race, not far from where Petty hit.

And shortly after Purvis's crash, Randy LaJoie went into the wall at about the same spot.

LaJoie was taken by ambulance to Concord (N.H.) Hospital for precautionary reasons and later released with only bruises. Purvis, with an Adam Petty No. 45 sticker on his chest along with a black ribbon, walked out of the infield medical center and checked out his damaged car.

A private memorial service for Petty will be held Monday at High Point (N.C.) College

Kyle Petty, Adam's father, was in Europe with his wife, Patti, when he heard about the death of his oldest son. The Petty family also suffered a loss April 5 when Lee Petty, Adam's great-grandfather and a NASCAR pioneer, died at age 86.

The Petty family did not release a statement Saturday, nor did NASCAR say what caused Petty's car to hit the wall. His car was inspected and released to his team Friday night.

Speculation around the track continued to be that the throttle on Petty's Sprint PCS Chevrolet stuck and, although he slammed on the brakes, it was not enough to keep the car from speeding into the wall.

"That could have been it," said Mike Helton, a NASCAR vice president and its chief operating officer. "But we don't speculate on causes. There's no point. It's more a process of reviewing what parts and pieces did and didn't do."

NASCAR may inspect the car and circumstances further and then review the information with the crews, Helton said.

"We're all in this together when we work on safety issues," he said. "It's whatever we can do to make things better. That's how we got to this point."

As the Petty family gathered in North Carolina to grieve, NASCAR carried on. It's the mentality that put the drivers back on the track Friday evening for one last round of practice.

There was a moment of silence before the race, which had an estimated attendance of 24,000, a few thousand below normal, and the NASCAR car-hauler drivers did a last lap in Petty's memory after the day's racing ended. "It was a really hard day to concentrate out there," said Jason Keller, who finished third. "I got thinking about a lot of things you probably shouldn't be thinking about in a race car. I knew Adam real well and we've had a lot of fun. I know he was watching us all today. This one's for Adam."

Friday morning, Keller and Petty were giving each other grief in the press room before practice. Petty gave Keller a hard time about his upcoming 30th birthday, while Keller gave it right back, focusing on Petty's youth. He would have turned 20 July 10.

"Like Jason, I really didn't want to get in that race car today," said Jeff Green, who placed second. "Adam being 19 years old, that's a devastating blow to our sport. And him being such a class guy. Nothing bothered Adam. He always had a smile on his face."

Smiles were maybe a little easier to come by Saturday than the day before, said Tim Fedewa, who took the checkered flag.

"(Friday), I didn't feel so good about anything," Fedewa said. "Today, I was thinking more about how Adam enjoyed life. If we can enjoy life half as good as he did, we'll be doing pretty good."

Saturday, the thoughts were of Petty and Keller in the press room Friday or of Petty's first Winston Cup race last month in Texas.

"That's what most impressed me, qualifying his first time out," said driver Joe Bessey. "He qualified and his father didn't."

And there were thoughts of last year and Petty's first appearance here. Petty laughed about being clean-cut, as opposed to his father, who sports long hair and earrings. He talked of being a vegetarian and racing go-karts from age 6, while his younger brother, Austin, preferred airplanes, and younger sister, Montgomery Lee, rode horses.

And he talked of being a Petty in the world of racing and how his father took the pressure off him.

"My father's an awesome racer and I've learned more from him," Adam said. "But when he came along the fans and media and everyone expected him to be the next Richard Petty. About halfway through his career people realized there wasn't going to be another Richard Petty. There will never be another Richard Petty, so the pressure eased up. There isn't any pressure on me. I just want to go out here and make a name for myself and come out and win a lot of races."