Carl Edwards profile: 33 reasons the word backflip does not appear in this story

33 REASONS

WITH 16 CAREER WINS—AND A NEAR MISS OF LAST YEAR’S SPRINT CUP CHAMPIONSHIP— YOU’VE SEEN PLENTY OF CARL EDWARDS’ VICTORY CELEBRATIONS. BUT IF YOU DON’T LOOK PAST THE TRACK, YOU’RE MISSING THE BEST PART.

By Matt Crossman Photo by Mark Sluder for SN

THE WORD

DOES NOT APPEAR IN THIS STORY Edwards doesn’t just fly around the track. He likes to put on miles in an airplane, too.

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CARL EDWARDS 33 reasons the word backflip does not appear in this story

1.

In the offseason, Edwards took a bicycle trip in Thailand. Next offseason, he hopes to visit Africa. “I really want to go around the world in a boat,” Edwards says. “My buddies who have spent some time on boats say, ‘Just go spend a week on one and tell me what you think.’ It would be really cool to see the world as, essentially, up until the last 200 years, that’s how everyone saw the world.”

6.

“I just like novel experiences.

Life’s too short, man. I want to see some stuff.”

Edwards (second from right) caused quite a mess at Talladega last season.

18.

7.

It’s a contradiction that a man intent on seeing the world lives where he grew up (Columbia, Mo.), but that’s where he is happiest. “I’m not ‘just Carl’ (there),” he says. “It’s ‘Carl, can you clean up your yard a little a bit?’ ”

8.

4.

He flies a stunt plane. “He’s willing to try anything. I’m not talking about anything within reason,” NASCAR president Mike Helton says.

“He’s willing to try anything.”

Such as loops before he knows how. “We went up, did some barrel rolls, maneuvers, stuff like that,” says Darrell Jones, Edwards’ friend and his first stunt plane passenger. “He says, ‘Have you ever done a complete loop?’ I said, ‘No, let’s try it.’

So we went down about 160 knots, pulled all the way back, and when we got inverted, it started to shimmy a little bit.”

Three more times Edwards tried, pulling more G’s each time, and all three times the plane did the same thing—it reached the top of the loop, shook and stalled. The faster he went, the more the plane shook. Edwards eventually learned that he needed to pull fewer G’s, not more, to complete the loop.

— Mike Mittler

“He was a real daredevil with cars,” says Mike Mittler, a truck series team owner who gave Edwards his big break in NASCAR. “Jerking on the e-brake, spinning the thing around going up the exit ramp on the highway coming back from lunch. Guys crying, ‘Let me out, let me out.’ ”

52 | SEE A DIFFERENT GAME 03/16/2009

3.

He has not outgrown that.

(See Nos. 9 and 28.)

Many drivers barely tolerate corporate appearances.

Edwards relishes them, which stops sounding like baloney when you hear it constantly. Mindy Kramer, director of public relations for Office Depot (Edwards’ former sponsor), was at work one day when the receptionist buzzed her. A man calling himself Carl Edwards had shown up unannounced. “I was like, ‘Is he lost?’ ” Kramer says. Nope. He just wanted to meet everybody.

9. In January, Edwards was trying to avoid being late for an appearance at Daytona.

Driving an SUV, he mashed the gas upon entering the tunnel that goes under the track. The exit of the tunnel is at the end of a steep incline, and the SUV flew—literally— into the infield. The landing left a gouge on the asphalt 45 feet from the end of the tunnel. Edwards pulled up to a man directing traffic and rolled down his window. A look of recognition crossed the man’s face. “You, again,” he said.

WRECK: KEVIN GLACKMEYER / AP; EDWARDS: HAROLD HINSON FOR SN; ARPIN: COURTESY ARPIN FAMILY

Everyone who knows Edwards (top right), including Roush, has a good Edwards story. Many of those stories involve an airplane.

‘HE WAS A REAL DAREDEVIL WITH CARS’

2.

17.

Edwards apologizes for his confrontation with Kenseth but little else. “I’m not going to lay down for anybody,” he says. “I stand up for what I think is right. I’m not going to let somebody ever walk on me.”

20.

His wife, Kate Downey, is a doctor. They graduated from high school together but never dated until they “re-met” two years ago. They married in January. Her take on the stunt plane (No. 4): “I don’t think there’s anything more fun that you can do. It’s like the best roller coaster times 10.” Also: “It’s my goal to not throw up.”

Much of the rest of the field after Edwards caused a huge wreck at Talladega last season.

THE NEXT CARL EDWARDS

19.

He doesn’t always take himself that seriously.

“I can look back and laugh about stuff that has happened. Here’s these millionaires, who live these great lives, and they’re fighting over something so stupid.”

Arpin grew up just north of the Minnesota border.

Downey actually encourages Edwards’ dangerous hobbies.

Every year, Edwards rides his bicycle from Columbia to Madison, Ill., for a Nationwide Series race. His trainer has made the trip with him and would have been quoted here, but he was in Australia with another client who likes to ride bikes. That other client is named Lance.

Name: Steve Arpin Age: 25 Hometown: Fort Frances, Ontario. That’s so far north that now that he lives in Charlotte, he is 300 miles closer to Toronto (by car).

How he’s like Carl: He learned to race on dirt tracks, as Carl did. He is earnest and driven and incapable of sitting around and waiting for something to happen.

Much of Edwards’ appeal lies in his Midwestern aw-shucksness. Arpin has a similar style—he lists “eh” as his favorite saying.

Two Edwardsesque stories: 1. “I made like $8,000 one summer racing bathtubs.” Seriously.

You take an old cast-iron tub, affix it to a boat that has had its hull removed, slap on an outboard motor, and away you go.

2. “We’ve had forklift races in the parking lot of my parents’ marine dealership up in Canada. We set up a bunch of cones. I flipped the forklift, but I won the race. I made the final pass coming on the outside of Turn 4

on the last lap. I went into Turn 1 (just past the start-finish line) a little bit too hard, and it kind of got away from me. I don’t know how it didn’t kill me, to be honest with you.”

This year: He is running in the ARCA Series and hopes to do well enough to attract attention from a NASCAR team. He already has relationships with several teams and drivers, including Edwards. He lived temporarily at Edwards’ home near Charlotte and has raced a USAC Silver Crown car owned by Edwards.

“I want to be the best racer I can be and race against the best in the country,” Arpin says. “That means I’m going to have to race against Carl Edwards and kick his (expletive) in a Cup car.”

Edwards says: “It’s unreal what he can do in a racecar. I saw him get in a USAC Silver Crown car, which is really hard to drive, and he performed better than anyone I’ve seen in his first time. The coolest thing about him is he’s a real nice guy.”

— Matt Crossman

10.

Edwards sometimes races too aggressively and struggles to control his temper, which has led to feuds with several drivers. His rivals have included: 11. Tony Stewart.

12. Dale Earnhardt Jr., whom Edwards confronted in victory lane after Earnhardt bumped him out of the way during the race. To go into anyone’s victory lane is bold. To go into Dale Jr.’s is to interrupt Superman in the phone booth.

13. Kyle Busch.

14. Elliott Sadler.

15. Kevin Harvick, who called Edwards a pansy after Edwards caused a big wreck (see No. 17).

16. Teammate Matt Kenseth, at whom Edwards feigned a punch, and …

CARL EDWARDS FLIPS FOR WINS AND SWEET ONION CHICKEN TERIYAKI. EDWARDS, ROUSH: ALAN MARLER FOR SN; EDWARDS: MARK SLUDER FOR SN

Carl Edwards drives for team owner Jack Roush, whose “only Carl Edwards would do that” story starts several thousand feet in the air. Roush, Edwards and others were on Roush’s plane, flying to Pocono, Pa. The runway lights didn’t come on, and because of fog, the pilot couldn’t see the runway.

On the ground, Tom Giacchi, a lifelong friend of Edwards’, scurried around looking for gasoline. He planned to make strips of fire on either side of the runway—like in Die Hard 2.

“That’s not really a Carl story, but it reflects the kind of people he keeps around him and what their mindset is—he wanted to set the airport on fire to get us on the ground,” Roush says. True, it’s not a Carl story. But it became one.

The plane was diverted to Wilkes-Barre, Pa., where Edwards’ spotter met the group with a pickup truck.

There weren’t enough seats, so Edwards insisted on riding in the bed of the truck. The spotter was an aspiring racer, and he used the drive through the mountains at night to try to impress Roush. The more treacherous the road became, the faster he went.

Says Roush: “I said, ‘When Bambi appears in the middle of the road, don’t hit the ditch, don’t show me you can miss him—center-punch him and make sure you hit him right in the center of the grille so he will stick. I’ll be more impressed with that than if you spin it out and pitch Carl out of the back.”

5.

21.

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CARL EDWARDS 33 reasons the word backflip does not appear in this story

24.

Edwards sat in on a surgery on which Carl Giacchi—the brother of runway-firestarting, grilled-ham-andcheese-making Tom—was assisting. “It was great until like five minutes in and there was an open torso. I had to sit down,” Edwards says. “I’ve never almost passed out, but if I stood up for five more seconds, I was going to fall down.”

This provided revenge for Carl Giacchi. He had flown on a fighter jet piloted by Edwards and tossed his cookies. “It was fun to see him get a little queasy in the medical world,” Giacchi says. “I’m sure if I went 200 mph down a backstretch, I’d freak out.”

25.

Edwards was a teenager the first time he flew solo.

Everything went fine … until he had to land. “The tower said, ‘Make left traffic for runway two-zero.’ Make left traffic, every pilot in the world knows, that means you make left turns,” Edwards says.

Every pilot but one.

“I just couldn’t figure out what that meant,” he says.

“After full-on sweating bullets, thinking, I should know this, I’m going to get yelled at, I called back and said, ‘I’m a student pilot. Could you please tell me what make left traffic means?’

They said, ‘That means you make left turns until you line up with runway two-zero.’

Those guys gave me trouble about that forever.”

Edwards liked this trophy so much that he gave it away.

54 | SEE A DIFFERENT GAME 03/16/2009

26.

Before his racing career took off, Edwards worked as a substitute teacher. “They introduce you, then they walk out and shut the door,” he says.

“And you’re standing there. It was the same as ‘make left traffic, runway two-zero.’ ”

27. The Davie Brown Index measures celebrity endorsement potential across several attributes. In a recent study of the opinions of the general U.S. population, Edwards ranked second behind Helio Castroneves in the appeal category among motorsports personalities.

That means Edwards was first in NASCAR and ahead of everyone in Reason Nos. 11-17, plus Jeff Gordon, Jimmie Johnson, et. al.

28. He’s a multitasker.

He gave interviews for this story in-person while flying and driving … and over the phone while he carved doughnuts in a snow-covered parking lot. The tone of his voice never changed.

29.

He used to volunteer for the Boone County (Mo.) Sheriff’s Department.

He once rode along on a meth bust.

30.

Mittler—the guy who gave Edwards his career-launching break—says Edwards has “an above-genius level IQ.” Says Edwards’ wife: “He is someone, more than anyone I’ve ever met, who wants to learn, thirsts to learn.”

That matters on the track.

“He is an extremely intelligent person. It’s an enjoyment for me to work with him based on that alone,” says his crew chief, Bob Osborne.

31. That’s the number (approximately) of teeth visible when Edwards smiles. His grin is as friendly and disarming as it is toothy. But make no mistake, behind that toothy grin lies a ruthless competitor (see Nos. 10-18). He’s Richie Cunningham with a shiv in his sock, bucko.

32.

“Right at the very beginning, when we had no sponsorship for him, weren’t going to run him, we had a full-time sponsor for him in the alcohol category,” says Geoff Smith, president of Roush Fenway Racing. “He ended up saying it was killing him, but he’d have to stay home and not become a racer, no matter what his contract said, he just wasn’t going to do it.”

33. The final reason comes with an apology because ending with this one guarantees that this song will be in your head today, tomorrow and on into eternity.

Edwards sometimes hums to himself while he’s racing: “I like the one, it has nothing to do with racing, it goes, ‘All I can say is that my life is pretty plain. I like watching the puddles gather rain.’ I sing that to myself.”

It’s Edwards’ time to be king In 2008, Carl Edwards led the Sprint Cup Series in wins and average finish. But he didn’t win the championship because of two breakdowns in the Chase, one mechanical and one his own. There’s an old saying that a driver has to lose a championship before he wins one. Now that Edwards has lost one, is he ready to win one? Sporting News asked seven former championship drivers who among them have 18 titles. Each said yes.

Richard Petty, 1964, ’67, ’71, ’72, ’74, ’75, ’79.

“He was close this past year. He’s just got to get everything on his side. He’d be a good champion because he’s a little different than the cookie-cutter guys that we’ve had in the past.”

Darrell Waltrip, 1981, ’82, ’85.

“He and (crew chief) Bob Osborne, I like that combination.

He’s already a focused guy; he’s going to be even more a focused guy now. I think he’s going to have a big, big year.”

Cale Yarborough, 1976, ’77, ’78.

“He’s a good racecar driver and a fine fellow, it looks like.

He looks to me like he’s got the determination and the skills to be a champion.”

Ned Jarrett, 1961, ’65.

“He certainly has the talent.

He has matured tremendously over the last few years. He certainly has the team and everything he needs to win it.”

Bobby Allison, 1983.

“He has a good feel, a lot of enthusiasm. He’s a very likable guy, and he shows really good talent in the racecar.”

Dale Jarrett, 1999.

“He’s poised to win it because he’s been in a battle for a couple of championships. He knows what he needs now. I believe it’s his to take this year.”

Rusty Wallace, 1989.

“It’s going to be really hard for Jimmie Johnson to win four in a row. But I think Jimmie will finish second, right on Carl’s bumper.”

— Matt Crossman

EDWARDS: HAROLD HINSON FOR SN

22.

There are numerous touching stories about Edwards giving away trophies. Here is one: Standing in victory lane at Michigan International Speedway after winning a Nationwide race last year, a few minutes after sticking the landing of his you-know-what, Edwards asked for a Sharpie.

He signed his trophy, To Eric, Never give up.

Eric is Eric Wright, a 14-year-old with juvenile rheumatoid arthritis. “I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, he’s giving him the trophy,’ ” says Julie Wright, Eric’s mom. “The look on your child’s face when something like that happens is irreplaceable.”

But there was confusion about what to do with the trophy, and Eric and his family left it behind to go eat.

Edwards refused to leave the task of delivering the trophy to Eric to others. “I don’t want to use the word desperate,” says Sammie Lukaskiewicz of Michigan International. “But he really wanted to find this young man.”

Edwards invited the Wrights to his motorcoach to re-gift the trophy to Eric. “He wanted to hand the child that trophy,” Julie Wright says.

“That, to me, was just as cool as giving it to him. He was very adamant about it.”

Edwards asked Wright in to his motorhome to eat. Giacchi, who drives Edwards’ motorhome and cooks on race weekends— when he’s not trying to set runways on fire (see No. 1)—whipped up a grilled ham and cheese sandwich.

23. One morning last summer, the Missouri football team arrived at Faurot Field at 6:30 for a workout session. Edwards was already there running the steps—and this after having visited victory lane the day before. “They couldn’t believe a guy would win a race and the next day be working out at 6:30 in the morning,” says coach Gary Pinkel, with whom Edwards texts after games and races.

And Edwards is not just an early morning workout nut. Late one night after a race, Edwards flew with the Richard Childress Racing team to a test. Driver Jeff Burton says Edwards won the race, and his “celebration” when the plane stopped for fuel was every bit as unique as his you-know-what. “Carl gets off the plane and goes running in the middle of the night, probably in the middle of nowhere,” Burton says. “Only Carl would do that. Everybody else would be eating fried chicken.”