Moore, who won 63 races and 43 poles as a team owner and crew chief, served in the European Theater. He survived perhaps the most brutal year ever endured by American armed forces, hitting Utah Beach on D-Day and moving inland to outlast the frozen forest of the Battle of the Bulge. Along the way, he earned two fistfuls of medals, and at one point he and a fellow soldier captured an entire platoon of Germans.
You think taking orders from Big Bill France was tough? Not after you've taken them from General George S. Patton.
On Wednesday night, "NASCAR Now" aired a great interview with Moore that was conducted by my ESPN.com colleague Ed Hinton. You can see it here. After the story aired, I came on the show to talk about Moore, along with former NASCAR champ turned ESPN analyst Rusty Wallace. "NASCAR Now" host Mike Massaro asked me to recall a Moore memory, and it didn't take me long to think of one.
It was during the 1998 season, NASCAR's 50th anniversary celebration, and I was a still-young producer for the late, great "RPM 2Night." My Bud Moore introduction was made by Tom Higgins of the Charlotte Observer, no less than the greatest NASCAR writer who has strolled through the Cup garage. No sooner than I had sat down, Moore asked for a favor. I was startled. What could he possibly want from me?
"Your career is just getting going," he said, pointedly. "When you are writing about sports or producing television about sports, please do me a favor and get rid of the war clichés. You know, 'the race was a war, it was life or death,' all that stuff. There's nothing like war but war. And anyone who has ever been stuck in the middle of a real war knows that no ballgame or race should ever be likened to that. Never."
In the 11 years since, I can't honestly say that I am batting 1.000 fulfilling Moore's request, but I have certainly tried. And rarely have I slipped behind a keyboard or into an edit suite without remembering what he said to me.
Give us Moore
Speaking of Higgins, no sports writer has spent more time at or away from the track with Moore than Pap has. Their friendship has lasted so long and runs so deep that the two men sat together at the NASCAR Hall of Fame announcement last month, ending a day when they also had served together as members of the 25-person voting panel.
Because of that friendship, Higgins writes about Moore like no other. Here's a sampling:
• From the Tom Higgins' Scuffs blog at the Observer in 2006: "Bud Moore, American Hero".
• And another Scuff, this from early this past summer: "Hard-Nosed Racer Was In The Thick Of D-Day".
Other great Moore links:
• Matt Cobbs of the Spartanburg Herald-Journal caught up with the local legend in the summer of 2008.
• The official site of Bud Moore Engineering.
• Moore's video bio that was posted by NASCAR after he was announced as a candidate for the Hall of Fame's first class.
Speed mail
Dear Ryan,
I thoroughly enjoyed Carl Edwards's visit to "The Price Is Right" on Tuesday morning. You were right, he is too smooth. I also enjoyed NASCAR week on "Are You Smarter Than A 5th Grader?" Is this the first time that NASCAR racers have made the game show circuit?
Bobby Thompson
Surprise, Ariz.
Bobby,
No sir, racers have been taking cracks at televised games, quizzes and spinning wheels for decades from "Wheel Of Fortune" to "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?" Jeff Gordon made the "Millionaire" appearance, thudding out at $32,000. He was handed a pop music question to which the answer was Billy Joel. He phoned a friend, another Charlotte Observer writer, David Poole, who was no help. It's been eight years, and Gordon still gets ribbed about his early exit. The earliest game show appearance by a racer that I know of is A.J. Foyt's appearance on CBS' "I've Got A Secret" the week after his 1961 Indy 500 win. Believe it or not, there's video of it on YouTube. And is it just me, or does former Miss America Bess Myerson seem to be a little taken with Super Tex?
Dear Ryan,
You have long been a proponent of shortening Sprint Cup races, have you not? So, will you be on your usual high horse this weekend during the Subway Fresh 500 at Phoenix?
Torin
Tempe, Ariz.Torin,
No! Yes, I will be raising heck about 500-mile races (you know me well, Torin), but not in the manner you're expecting. Phoenix is actually one of the tracks that has long understood that NASCAR's obsession with the number 500 is unhealthy. Yes, the Phoenix race has "500" in the title, but they are 500 kilometers, not miles. It's the perfect solution. The track gets to cling to the romanticism of the five-bill number, but they don't make us endure a four-plus-hour race because of it. The IndyCar Series also has gone the silent "K" route for a while now with the exception of, obviously, the Indianapolis 500.
Yo Ryan,
I liked your look at the stock car up-and-comers that ran the ARCA season finale at Rockingham in October. Any updates?
Spicoli in Ridgemont
Hi Jeff, Mr. Hand would like to see you after class ...
There is a big development, and it has happened just this week. Justin Lofton, who won the ARCA title that day at The Rock, apparently really impressed those Toyota talent scouts that I wrote about. Lofton just signed on with Red Horse Racing's NASCAR Truck Series for 2010. He was one of the few young guys without a pre-existing development deal with a big Cup team. Looks like that's changing.
Ryan McGee
