Ex-kicker Cofer collects Bullring win

Friday, Feb. 28, 2003 | 10:22 a.m.

Mike Cofer owns two Super Bowl rings, but the former field goal ace admitted he had never gotten as big a kick from sports as he did late Thursday night at The Bullring on the grounds of the Las Vegas Motor Speedway.

Cofer, 39, beat Kyle Busch by a bus length in the KB Home Showdown, a 100-lap event for Super Late Models which kicked off a NASCAR weekend that will culminate in the UAW-DaimlerChrysler 400 on Sunday.

The victory was worth $2,000 to Cofer and his racing team.

"There is nothing as exciting as this," Cofer said. "I mean, whether it's behind the seat, or watching someone working on a car, putting it together and then watching someone go out there and be successful with it ...

"I love football, and I love watching football and I loved playing football. But I hated standing on the sideline, waiting to go in there and kick it. I didn't mind when I was on the field. I did not mind lining it up. But I hated standing on that sideline. That was no fun at all."

Cofer spent most of his eight-year kicking career with the San Francisco 49ers. Two years ago, he moved to Henderson with his wife and two children, and a partnership with owner Jerry Spilsbury has revitalized Cofer's racing career.

After slipping his yellow and black No. 04 Dodge Intrepid into the pits and parking the KB Home-sponsored speedster, he said he considered Thursday to be his own personal Daytona 500.

When the race resumed after a caution flag was raised on the 95th lap, Cofer quickly passed Scott Gafforini and kept Busch at bay.

"We got the Winston Cup guys coming into town," Cofer said. "We got the Busch guys already in town. You got a lot of NASCAR folks who are in town already. I met a lot of them (Wednesday) night, and maybe we get to meet a lot of them over the course of the weekend.

"And in meeting those people, it's awful good to go up to them and say, 'Yeah, we won that Late Model 100-lapper over there yesterday.' "

He said he thinks about Winston Cup racing constantly and that, eventually, he might attract enough sponsors to enable him to compete on the big track at LVMS.

"(Thursday night) certainly helps our confidence," Cofer said. "Hopefully, it will help the sponsors who are looking to get involved in motor sports. 'Hey, they've been beatin' the pavement, hammerin' out fenders and they're professional. Let's take a look at them.'

"At some point, someone has to take a chance on you."

Cofer grew up in Charlotte, N.C., but racing didn't woo him until he was a junior in high school. The leader of his Bible-study group was a photographer who needed help carrying his equipment around the track of a NASCAR event, and Cofer obliged.

He stood next to Darrell Waltrip at Charlotte Motor Speedway.

"Man, you wouldn't believe what I did the other day!" Cofer told his high school buddies. "I was at the racetrack, right up by the car!"

Cofer kicked at North Carolina State, and the celebrity of an NFL career enabled him to meet, then befriend, Davey Allison, the 1992 Daytona 500 champion. Allison won races the first three times Cofer attended as his guest.

"Cofer," Allison said, "you're coming to every damn race I have!"

Cofer tried explaining his football career to Allison, that he would be busy with the 49ers from the late summer through fall. Allison wouldn't listen. "I don't care," he said, "you're goin' racin'!"

Davey Allison was killed in a helicopter crash at Talladega on July 13, 1993.

"I really miss him," Cofer said. "That was a tragic loss. After that, I said ... man, that kind of blew racing out of the water for me. I kind of got out of it. Then I said, 'Davey wouldn't have wanted you to get out of it because he got killed. He'd want you to go ahead and race.'

"So that's what I kept doing."