Jerry Nadeau's Awesome Banzai Move at Sonoma, June 1998

On this day at this moment, yours truly became a Jerry Nadeau fan.

When the green flag dropped on the 1998 Save Mart / Kragen 350 at Sonoma, Nadeau, the outside-polesitter, made a daring pass on Jeff Gordon going into turn two to take the lead. Driving the #13 First Plus Financial Ford for Bill Elliott and Dan Marino's team, Nadeau sped around Gordon in turn one, but overdrove turn two and drove through the dirt.

Though he managed to save his car and avoid contact with the leaders, Nadeau lost the lead to Gordon and damaged his track bar, causing Nadeau to wreck a few laps later in the Esses. Nadeau finished 43rd, tail-end of the field.

Nadeau would finally lead his first laps during the middle stages of the 1999 event at Watkins Glen, leading nine laps during green-flag pit stops.

Not being much of a Jeff Gordon fan, particularly during his dominant 1998 season, I was really excited to see someone try so valiantly to make a move on him. Being a driver for a lesser-known single-car operation as well as a newcomer, I revered his underdog status and wore a #13 hat when I cheered him on during his amazing run as a road ringer in the 2002 Infineon event four years later. :)

Clip includes the start and the opening laps of the race, including Sterling Marlin's equally-gutsy pass on the inside of turn 11 and Ron Hornaday's spin at the exit of The Chute driving Tim Beverly's new car after contact with Brett Bodine.

Category:

Sports

Tags:

• jerry
• nadeau
• sears
• point
• 1998
• 13
• marino
• elliott
• save
• mart
• kragen
• 350
• sonoma
• california
• nascar
• winston
• nextel
• infineon

[dcvanta]

I was there, turn 3a, my 1st live NASCAR race in 98. Sears Point looked so much different back then. I also have this race on tape, maybe I should try to upload that in high quality?

[nadeau1064]

@dcvanta Sounds good to me; I don't really have time to upload better versions of all these video clips. :)

[tdiharold5265]

when i start making stop motions nadeau will be driving the 02

[nadeau1064]

@tdiharold5265 Sounds awesome. :)

[tdiharold5265]

@nadeau1064 oh it is want me to send you a list of the drivers

[nadeau1064]

@tdiharold5265 Sure, go for it. Send me a PM if you like. :)

[shmarmkilla]

locks like somthing i would do in my video game

[louieakaslip]

I wish that Nadeau would return to the track in a racecar some day. I would love to see him behind the wheel again.

[nucklehead2]

I'm glad they got rid of that old turn 4 thing and made the new one the way it is now

[kasey9fan]

@ROBLOXdude95 lol. wrong.

[racing202]

Holy crap! No one i don't think would do that nowadays.....

[ROBLOXdude95]

He did'nt pass. He was so nervous he did'nt know where to go because no one was infront of him and he did that.

[setoguchifan16]

i do that in nascar 04-08 all the time-doesn't always work, tho...