How many track workers does it take to deem a surface worthy of racing? The world may never know.
When one track official was asked 30 minutes into the scheduled time of the Auto Club 500 whether the 2-mile track formerly known as California Speedway was still leaking water through the seams — a problem referred to as “weeping” — in Turns 3 and 4, he answered, “The track still isn’t dry enough to tell.”
Two hours later, after safety crews spread speedy dry to soak up liquid from Michael Waltrip’s loose oil line, the race was finally under way, but the racetrack was still in no condition for competition.
Denny Hamlin initially proved that point on Lap 15, when he careened into the wall in Turn 3.
“I think we can get out there, but I think there’s 42 other drivers that will agree that we shouldn’t be racing on that track right now,” Hamlin said. “I hit a slick spot and my car took off.
“You can see it on television — right at the seams — it’s seeping a lot of water. I hit a wet spot and I’m not going to be the last one.”
Casey Mears was the next casualty. He hit the weepers six laps later coming out of Turn 1 and bounced off the wall in Turn 2, collecting Hendrick teammate Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Reed Sorenson. Sam Hornish Jr. saw smoke, but could not slow down fast enough before sliding underneath the back end of Mears’ car and flipping it over.
“We just got loose and the issue I kept having was as we crossed that bottom seam, getting in and out of one and then also into three and four, if you weren’t quite low enough, it was a little wet,” Mears said.
“The track is still seeping a good bit of water. I don’t know if that is why I got loose in (Turn 1) but in (Turns 3 and 4), it was still pretty wet. I had hit it a couple of times and in the center of (Turns 1 and 2), I hit that a couple of times. It is kind of hard to see. I don’t know if that is what sent me around. I was trying to save it.”
Mears said once his car caught fire, “It seems like it takes an eternity” before the rescue crews arrived. But Mears’ judgment was clouded by the severity of the situation as workers were dispatched to the scene immediately. Once the smoke cleared, his early point deficit sunk in. Mears was running third in last week’s Daytona 500 before he wrecked with six laps remaining and finished 35th. As a result, he was scored 42nd following the first race of the season.
“Now we are pretty bad in the points,” Mears said. “We have to rally back here.”
NASCAR red-flagged the race after the wreck on Lap 22, and track workers addressed the issue by drilling grooves into the racetrack to alleviate the weepers in Turns 3 and 4 — a problem that had wreaked havoc with the surface all weekend.
NASCAR spokesperson Kerry Tharp indicated the weepers were discovered during the first red flag.
“That’s when we asked people from the track to come make some notches in the track to let the water drain off. When we started the race, we had communication with the drivers through our radio scans and with the feedback we were getting from them, we were confident that the track was ready to race.
“We had so much rain in those particular areas of the track, there just wasn’t any where for it to go. It was seeping up. When we had the red flag, it was brought to our attention that those were out there and needed to be corrected. That’s why we held it up as long as we needed to because we had to make sure it was right.”
Two-time defending champion Jimmie Johnson, who surveyed the problem when it first arose on Friday along with teammate Jeff Gordon, said the water continued to rise over the asphalt in the first paving lane in all four corners.