2000 Los Angeles 500

The 2000 Los Angeles 500 was the 16th race of the Piston Cup in 2000. It is held at LA. The race is best known for an incident on lap 7 in which a part of The King's spoiler came loose and fell off and hit Ernie Gearson on the bottom left portion of the windshield, Ernie required to have View Zeen corrective windshields after the accident for 4 months (however Ernie chose to have them on for the rest of his life,due to it improving his eyesight), including in Cars 1. The King was considering removing his spoiler for good but the racers including Ernie convinced him not to.

Billy Oilchanger wins his fifth race win with Chick Hicks second and Murray Clutchburn third. There was also an incident on lap 136 when part-time racer Ralph Carlow spun around and crashed head on into James Cleanair.

Rookies Darren Leadfoot, Slider Petrolski, and Dale Earnhardt Jr, but not Dave Alternators (Davey Apex) raced but none finished higher than 13th place.

It's also one of the races of the five part-time racers, which are Kevin Shiftright, Todd Marcus, Ralph Carlow, Sage Vanderspin, and Aiken Axler. Pinkie Pie was not there due to being sick from eating too much apple pies. Having full season start the last year, Matthew Overtaker in the Apple team made a return after retiring of crashing in the 2000 Florida 500 reaching 4th.

Kevin Shiftright, Todd Marcus, Aiken Axler, and Sage Vanderspin were the four part-time racers to finish the race.

It's one of very few finishes of Johnny Blamer Davey Apex was not there due to retiring at a crash at the 2000 Homestead 350.

Ernie misses the Rev N Go 350 with replacement of Ryan Thunderbolt Jr.

## Television Biography

Network: CBS

Announcers: Bob and Darrell

## Transcript

### The King and Ernie Gearson Crash

Darrell: And they race happy ever after, **but look at King, look at King!** HE IS RACING AHEAD OF EVERYBODY!

Bob: Oh my!

Darrell: The King losing control... **HIS SUPERBIRD SPOILER! IT'S FLYING OFF! HOLY SHOOT! THE KING WING SPOILER HITS ERNIE GEARSON!**

Bob: And it **NAILS** Ernie Gearson on the windshield! That's gonna hurt!

Darrell: Ouch! That hurts! Oh my... oh my! Holy... I'm absolutely speechless! Geez! That was creepy! My freaking gosh!

Bob: That was so ridiculous.

Darrell: Oh my goodness. My goodness... GOSH! Oh my.

Bob: How spooky.

Darrell: Looks like Ernie is pulling into the DINOCO pits to get the spoiler off. After all they know how it works.

Bob: Let's go to River Scott, The King's pitty Luke Pettlework, and Piccolo Perry, Ernie Gearson's pitty. River?

Darrell: Hello and we're here with Luke Pettlework and Piccolo Perry, Piccolo what's the matter with Gearson?

Piccolo: He would probably be blind and might die soon.

River: And what about King?

Luke: He would be okay. His spoiler makes him look like a 1970 GTX or 1970 Roadrunner.

River: Now this is River Scott, a Hudson Hornet friend, now we're returning to you, Darrell.

Bob: We'll be back in just a moment, and right after this special UPN message, the UPN news, and a very special word from your local station. Stand by LONGLY.

(Message, commercials, Piston Cup news, and more commercials play)

Darrell: We're live at the Los Angeles International Speedway, there was a lot of oil, of course, and debris on the TRACK!! The red flag is out and will be out for many minutes, probably almost an hour. Also there might be green/white/checker for very good, very very good.

Bob: Might have been resulted terrible for Gearson and he would miss the next two races, the Grandol Oil 500 live on ESPN and the Mario Andretti 400 at Chicagoland telecast by NBC and the third he would probably miss is the famous 350 miler at Boston Speedway since 1957, the Boston 350 live on The WB, formerly telecast on syndication from 1957 to 1986 and FOX from 1987 to 1994, where 1995 is the year of The WB's first Boston race, the 350 miler Boston 350.

## Results

1. Billy Oilchanger - 200 laps
2. Chick Hicks - 200 laps
3. Murray Clutchburn - 200 laps
4. Mac Icar - 200 laps
5. Manny Flywheel - 200 laps
6. Greg Candyman - 200 laps
7. Sage Vanderspin - 200 laps
8. Crusty Rotor - 200 laps
9. Chuck Armstrong - 200 laps
10. Claude Scruggs - 200 laps
11. Winford Bradford Rutherford - 200 laps
12. Ruby Oaks - 200 laps
13. Darren Leadfoot - 200 laps
14. Todd Marcus - 200 laps
15. Aiken Axler - 200 laps
16. Slider Petrolski - 200 laps
17. Ryan Shields - 200 laps
18. Floyd Mulvhill - 200 laps
19. Brush Curber - 200 laps
20. Lee Revkins - 200 laps
21. Kevin Shiftright - 200 laps
22. Misti Motorkrass - 200 laps
23. Haul Inngas - 200 laps
24. Rusty Cornfuel - 200 laps
25. Dirkson D'agostino - 200 laps
26. Johnny Blamer - 200 laps
27. Ralph Carlow - 136 laps(spun and crashed)
28. James Cleanair - 136 laps(crashed)
29. Dale Earnhardt Jr - 118 laps(engine)
30. Kevin Racingtire - 76 laps(crashed into Eugene Carbureski)
31. Eugene Carbureski - 76 laps(crashed in Kevin Racingtire)
32. Dale Earnhardt Sr - 52 laps(engine fire)
33. Gerald Leadfoot - 31 laps(punctured tire and crashed)
34. The King - 7 laps(spoiler comes off)
35. Ernie Gearson - 7 laps(struck in the windshield,missed the 2000 Rev N Go 350)

## Gallery

Ernie "Gidyup" Gearson's windshield is striked by Strip "The King" Weathers' spoiler.Ernie's View Zeen Wipers in the 2004 Los Angeles 500