Tag: Daytona 500

The coincidence, or the weird, or the ironic…

Not sure which…

Daytona and the opening of NASCAR offered a generous and exciting start to the season but it also raised the spirit of the modern sport itself.

It’s all a bit spooky…

Consider the recap. Richard Childress brings the #3 back to Cup with driver and grandson Austin Dillon. Dillon has done the number proud with the trucks and a championship in the Nationwide series.

Dillon qualifies with the #3 on the pole for the Daytona 500. The first return of the #3 to Cup since the tragic loss of Dale Earnhardt (the man that made the number an icon) and it is leading the pack for the start of the new NASCAR season. (more…)

It’s kind of spooky. Cool, yes… But spooky.

The #3 is back in the top series of NASCAR. It’s been on the Camping World Series trucks and the next level Nationwide Series. It won a Nationwide Championship last year in 2013. Now, that driver that won with it has brought it into the Sprint Cup. His grandfather is the owner. The kid grew up surrounded by it.

Austin Dillon and Richard Childress Racing. RCR owns the number and had kept it off the tracks for several years after Dale Earnhardt drove it to 7 championships and, finally, to his death at the Daytona 500 in 2001. (more…)

Was it a plan to begin with or simply a result of experience on racing?

Yes… Jeff Gordon overtook Danica Patrick on lap one of the Daytona 500 to lead it for the opening laps. Patrick seemed all too happy to ride along in the 2 spot between Gordon and Kyle Busch.

That was the start of the Great American Race as they turned those opening laps over an obvious light spot on the front stretch. That spot was the remnant of an airborne blender from the Nationwide Series race the day before. That incident was on everyone’s mind all morning long not because of the track damage so much as race fans were involved and injured. Drivers spin and crash as almost a matter of course but fans involved casts a shadow over it all…

In-race reports kept updates on those fans which still listed a few in the hospital but recovering well. (more…)

Where did they have it tucked away over the weekend?

The speed, that is…

Wednesday practice at Daytona was showing several cars running above 197 mph. A couple topped 198…

It is interesting as the qualifying topped in the midway over 196. Danica Patrick snagged the pole with a lap of 196.434. Wednesday, Michael Waltrip pushed his Toyota 2mph faster.

Does this point to pack running with a draft, weather, gravity, lunar phase, the price of oranges…? Does this point to immediate trouble for Patrick to hold that position or is this an indicator for this new Gen-6 car in a pack race over single run qualifying?

We probably won’t have to wait long. The Budweiser Duals will likely give a better indication than the Sprint Unlimited from the weekend.

The season, the pressure, the questions and the price of oranges are all on the table for the Daytona 500.

Wow.

Is it a surprise that Danica Patrick rolls out on top of the grid for the Daytona 500? Perhaps… But her position as the pole sitter says something about her adaptation to the sport despite her general lack of experience compared to many veterans who drove laps behind her. However, it was just a year ago she was on the pole for the Nationwide Series opener at Daytona. How many times has a Nationwide Daytona pole winner come back in a Sprint Cup series car to win the pole the very next year?

The real surprise is the unwelcome response from too many “NASCAR” fans about Patrick and her mere presence inside a Sprint Cup car. What is it that makes some of these “fans” so adamant in their dislike? Is it that she is a woman? Is that really the only reason? Are they really that narrow? She is certainly not the first woman to get behind the wheel… (more…)

The time is upon us. The official beginning of racing season…

OK – The ROLEX 24 was the actual beginning. However, as sexy and sleek as the Grand-Am cars are and as fun as that race is to watch there is no escaping that everyone knows what the Daytona 500 is…

The NASCAR opener is the start in the minds of most to get the engines hot and the wheels rolling. So grab your hats (if the drivers still match) and get ready for Daytona to go bright again with the sound of horsepower.

There is a lot to see for this one, too. First and foremost is the new “Gen-6” Sprint Cup car. It’s been tested on the track and the tunnel but our first chance to see it really race will be this weekend for the “Sprint Unlimited”. (formerly the Budweiser Shootout) (more…)

The only thing missing from the Monday night Daytona 500 was James Taylor and Tom Cruise. We already have the Three Stooges as Grand Marshals..

However, as a movie drama the editing was botched. The lap 2 crash should have been put off till much later. Why would you cast a record champion, a rookie winner and an antagonist woman and have them out in just the second lap…? That doesn’t make hay for a good story.

But wait…! We get a fire explosion in the last quarter of the film! On top of that we get the most popular star into an “almost win” scenario at the finish!

What…!?

“And then… we flash forward from Victory Lane to the end of the season and the Earth implodes in December as the fire damaged pavement cracks open causing a world-wide chain reaction with John Cusack in a small plane…”

“Can we get George Clooney…?”

The Daytona 500 was hardly the start of the Sprint Cup season that NASCAR wanted. There was just too much drama leading up to the actual race and too much “weird” in the race itself. Rain stayed over Daytona setting the scene for a first ever prime time night event. It was a poorly written script as a movie which makes it comical as reality. We should have guessed when we saw Darrell Waltrip talking with the Three Stooges… (more…)