The Worst Race of the Year: STRANGLEHOLD vs. DAMAGE, INC (Fifth Night)
While I could have gone in several different directions with the Best Race of the Season award, there is only one true contender for the Worst Race of the Season; Stranglehold vs. Damage, Inc Fifth Night. It was a race that was so epically bad, it was what originally spurred this series of season long awards. Immediately after the race’s conclusion, I thought, “That was horrendous! That was by far the worst race of the year… I’m going to have to write about that.” And thus the column idea was born.
In 2009 and 2010, fans of the TDA got to watch Phil Matlak’s team Smash, Bash and Crash take bad to a near art form. Whether it was Smash, Bash and Crash’s ability to be unprepared, their uniquely bad car building,* their astoundingly poor driving skills or the quizzically timed trash-talking they put on display, Matlak and his drivers pushed the bar for ‘awful’ down quite a ways. Even when Matlak’s car would leave the starting line, it was hard to champion this fact A) because that’s what the cars are supposed to do, and B) because it was difficult to make note of this accomplishment with Matlak sitting in his car wearing a hockey helmet.
* Orange Crush’s Ryan Bleuer still shakes his head at the fact that, Third Night of 2010, one of Smash, Bash and Crash’s drivers pulled onto the track with his car radio on.
The one thing that Matlak and Smash, Bash and Crash didn’t have going for them was a partner in crime; another team out there that was almost as bad as they were. It wasn’t possible to have a battle of doormats with Smash, Bash and Crash around for the simple reason they were just that much worse than everyone else.
What separated the Stranglehold/Damage, Inc race from the rest of the races in 2011 was the sense that both teams seemed to be working as hard as they could to out suck than the other. These were two teams without anything to race for… and it showed. I mean, the race ended with a countdown and I believe the winning car for Damage, Inc was on his second lap.
And while the race was an affront to the eyes, I will give it this: it was equally interesting. It contained the only double backwards driver’s door shot I’ve ever seen. This maneuver unfolded when a Damage, Inc. car and a Stranglehold car were both driving side-by-side in reverse when the Stranglehold car made a sharp turn and backed into the Damage, Inc car’s driver door. It was also the only race I can remember where one of the winning team’s drivers (Dave “Repo” Swan) spent the last half of the race outside the track wall cheering his teammates on and pointing at a variety of things for them to take notice of.
The race also was red-flagged at one point for a phantom fire in Stranglehold driver Nick Hartung’s car, featured a gargantuan amount of missed hits, numerous cars attempting to pick up real estate going backwards and such an awful display of running to start the race that I wrote in my notebook: I think there might be eight crushers on the track.