Columnist Brian Hilderbrand: Scaled back workload may pay off for Petty

Friday, Feb. 1, 2002 | 10:51 a.m.

Brian Hilderbrand covers motor sports for the Las Vegas Sun. His motor sports notebook appears Friday. He can be reached at bh@lasvegassun.com or (702) 259-4089.

He may be coming off the least successful and most disappointing season of his career, but Kyle Petty was one of the most relaxed drivers in the Winston Cup garage during this week's NASCAR test at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.

For the first time in his 23-year Winston Cup career, Petty failed to post a top-10 finish. He also failed to make the field at 12 of the 36 points races and finished a career-low 43rd in the final points standings.

But for the first time in six years, Petty goes into a Winston Cup season with only one job: driver.

After overseeing his family's Petty Enterprises racing operation for the past several years, the 41-year-old son of racing legend Richard Petty has slowly weaned himself from the responsibility of the day-to-day operations.

Petty Enterprises hired Rusty Wallace's former crew chief, Robin Pemberton, earlier this month as vice president and general manager -- a role that Petty filled the past few years.

"We were very fortunate, very blessed, to be able to hire Robin," Petty said. "This was a time in his life when he wanted to spend more time at home and the job that we have for him here at Petty Enterprises allows him to spend a lot more time at home -- he doesn't have to go the racetrack every week.

"(Pemberton's hiring) gives me an opportunity to go back to just driving the 45 car and Robin can look after the 43, 44 and the 45 cars and be the general manager. It allows him to do a lot more of the day-to-day work in the organizational part of it."

Petty said Pemberton's hiring was just one in a number of steps to bring the family racing business back to where it can be competitive on a consistent basis.

But Petty cautioned not to expect immediate results.

"When you look at it, (last year) was a terrible year for us on the racetrack but there were a lot of things that we worked through that were important; things away from the racetrack," he said.

"We made a lot of changes ... and it wasn't going to show up last year and it may not show up this year but it shows up long term. That's what we said from the very beginning: This is a long-term project, it wasn't something we were going to turn around in a year, it was going to take three to five years to turn around and we're still pretty much on schedule."

With that in mind, Petty has modest expectations for the 2002 season.

"We were really good at running 35th to 43rd (last year) but at the end of the year we got really good at running 25th to 35th," he said. "Realistically, for us, if we can come out this year and run consistently between 15th and 25th, that's a good year for us.

"We're not interested in biting off more than we can chew or making claims that we can't back up."

The temporary bleachers will be erected above Turn 3. The tickets, which went on sale today, are priced at $75 each and include a reserved seat at the Winston Cup race, general admission to the Busch Series race on Saturday, March 2, and general admission to the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race at LVMS in October.

Nemechek, who was testing his Winston Cup and Busch Series car at LVMS this week, said Thursday that the status of the sponsorship was "in limbo" before Kmart reached a decision on whether it would continue sponsoring the cars.

Three-time NHRA Top Fuel champion Gary Scelzi is scheduled to make his final licensing run this weekend in a Toyota-bodied Funny Car. Others expected to take part in the test include Top Fuelers Andrew Cowin, Doug Kalitta, Don Lampus, Rhonda Hartman-Smith and John Smith, Funny Car driver Cruz Pedregon and Pro Stock drivers George Marnell of Las Vegas and Tom Martino.

The test is scheduled for 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. each day. Admission is $15 for adults and $5 for seniors, military and students. Children under 12 will be admitted free. Drivers will be available for autographs and photos.

Jourdain replaces Max Papis, whose contract was not extended after the 2001 season, and will team with Las Vegas resident Jimmy Vasser. The Gigante Group is one of the leading self-service retail chains in Mexico.10Petty