And it's not just the combination of high-tech sports cars and road-weary weekend warriors and stock cars from shops in the Carolinas. It's not just the long-awaited debuts and anticipated reunions as teams descend upon Daytona just as their press releases promised the year before when their contracts were inked. It's not just the fact that, after a three-month offseason, it will be nice to see cars racing around a track somewhere.
I think it's the way that Daytona just creates surprises.
For me, it started with the 1996 Daytona 500, when Wally Dallenbach raced a white Ford Thunderbird wearing last year's sheetmetal and hastily-applied sponsor decals into a sixth-place finish in the biggest race of the year. Since then, I've realized that Daytona is for surprises. Somewhere, mixed in with the press releases and the predictable headlines, is a story about an underdog making good on their Daytona gamble, or some eleventh-hour deal putting a driver in a car just in time for qualifying. Sometimes it's the tale of big promises gone sour, or a satisfying Speedweeks going up in smoke on the pace lap. Motorsports is about expecting the unexpected, but never is this truer than at Daytona.
So far, Speedweeks 2011 isn't that much different.
One kid almost blew more than a .32: Less than two weeks from opening practice for the Nationwide Series DRIVE4COPD 300, Michael Annett was in the headlines. It wasn't for his new ride with Rusty Wallace's team; instead, he had been picked up for driving while intoxicated. Very intoxicated, if the Breathalyzer result is accurate. I doubted he would lose his ride - he does come along with sponsorship, after all - but if the initial accusations were correct, it seems a bit awkward that he can just slide behind the wheel of a race car. Michael has vowed to get a handle on his behavior; I hope he's sincere, for his sake.
ARCA ran a clean show: Every year, new kids show up in fast cars for the ARCA Racing Series opener, looking to turn heads while the NASCAR teams and top sponsors are sharing garage space. This year, eighteen-year olds Ty Dillon (grandson of Richard Childress) and Kyle Fowler (Venturini Motorsports' latest development driver) qualified on the front row at Daytona. Only twenty laps in, though, veteran Bobby Gerhart was in the lead, holding off Chris Buescher to capture his seventh overall win in the season opener. Gerhart led the final sixty-one laps, and with Buescher choosing caution over valor, it was a dull parade to the checkered flag. The biggest surprise was the fact that less than half the race was run under caution, a departure from the usual ARCA Daytona wreckfest. An honorable mention, though, must be given to the driver who finished eighteenth - James Hylton, who finished on the lead lap at the young age of 76.
Ladies steal the show, if not the results: Back when Shawna Robinson drove James Finch's Chevy to a second-place finish at Daytona in '99, it didn't matter that her greatest impact in NASCAR had been getting wrecked on the start at Atlanta after winning the pole in 1994. To be fair, having a woman in the starting grid was a big deal back then, and it's still more the exception than the norm today. But in the last few years, we've had a few women running several races, and only Danica Patrick has been called out by the announcers as if we might forget she was in the race otherwise. Last year, six women started the ARCA race at Daytona, and toward the end of the race, the broadcasters could only muster "what's-her-name" in regards to the young lady running third who wasn't Danica Patrick. (More on "what's-her-name" later.) This year, the broadcasters went on nonstop about the two women who qualified at Daytona, Maryeve Dufault and Milka Duno. Dufault, a Québec native, was making her oval-track stock-car debut with little fanfare. Duno crashed out early at Daytona last year, echoing her performance in other United States racing series where she has earned a reputation as a rolling chicane, only on the track because of her ties to sponsor CITGO. For the first half of the race, wrecks were typically described in relation to where the two ladies were running on the track. Interestingly, both were taken out in the same wreck fifteen laps from the end. Dufault plans to run the full ARCA schedule, but plans for Milka Duno are hazier, as she has been mentioned as a full-season driver behind the wheel of defending champion Patrick Sheltra's cars.
Sheltra finds a ride: Lately, the jump from feeder-series champ to rookie challenger has been hard for drivers who don't come as a package deal with their own sponsorship. I was going to count Patrick Sheltra in this crowd. Patrick won the 2010 ARCA Racing Series title after a couple wins and a steady season. He announced he would be moving to NASCAR for 2011, but the announcements were nowhere to be found. Meanwhile, Milka Duno (without results, but with a sponsor) tested Sheltra's car at Daytona. At last, this week Rick Ware Racing added another car to the Nationwide Series field at Daytona with Sheltra behind the wheel. Timmy Hill is scheduled to run the full season (starting at Phoenix, when he turns 18) in Ware's #15 car, so it's hard to say if the #41 will be a full-season effort for Sheltra or just a Daytona one-off. I hope he impresses.
A challenger appears: After a 2010 season in which one rookie made a full-season bid for Rookie of the Year, the 2011 ROTY campaign in Sprint Cup looked bleak. Raybestos pulled out as sponsor after 2010, and as of the start of Speedweeks, only Brian Keselowski had suggested he might run enough races to be eligible for Rookie of the Year. Some speculated Trevor Bayne may make a run for it in the Wood Brothers #21, but NASCAR squelched that talk this week stating that a driver has to run for points in the division, while Trevor is chasing the Nationwide title this year. This week, Andy Lally, driving the TRG Motorsports-sponsored Chevrolet at Daytona, signed up for the ROTY battle. I'm not sure how this will work into his road-racing schedule, but time will tell.
A local girl makes good: Last year, while ARCA broadcasters waxed poetic over Danica Patrick's stock-car debut, they glossed over a pearly-pink #15 Chevrolet running third, dismissing the driver as "what's-her-name." The girl in the pink Chevy was Alli Owens, who brought her longtime sponsor to Venturini for a partial season in 2010. With a few laps to go, she was running third until she got shuffled out of the draft and cut a tire. After the season, her sponsor (a voc-ed project backed by the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers) backed out due to the economy, leaving Alli high and dry for 2011. Still committed to race at her home track, Alli started shopping...this time, for sponsors. A few weeks before Daytona, it was confirmed that she would try to qualify a Ford truck for Ray Hackett Racing at Daytona. Local sponsors, including a chapter of the IBEW, a Daytona-area Ford dealership and even some fan contributors, signed on to back Alli's effort. In the first Truck Series practice, Alli clocked in at eleventh-fastest, the fastest Ford in the field.
Even champs struggle for rides: In 1995, Mike Skinner drove RCR's #3 Goodwrench truck to the inaugural NASCAR SuperTruck Series championship. After a lackluster 2010 season with Randy Moss Motorsports, in which Mike was critical of the involvement of his football-star team owner, it was expected (and eventually confirmed) that Mike Skinner would be looking for a 2011 ride. By the time it was confirmed, however, most of the competitive Toyota rides had been spoken for. Speculation pointed to the SS/Green Light Racing team, where David Starr had taken his sponsorship and Moss' #81 number mid-season, but nothing came up. A week before Speedweeks, Eddie Sharp (who moved his ARCA team to the Truck Series this year with Craig Goess) entered a second truck, #45, for Skinner to drive at Daytona. It's hard to believe that a driver with a winning record in the series could find, at best, a one-off deal to run at Daytona.
Junior lends a hand and a car: Jimmy Means isn't a name most people recognize. He was, in the spirit of J.D. McDuffie and Dave Marcis, an "independent," a driver who ran his own equipment without factory backing or much in the way of sponsorship. His Cup results were never much to look at. Neither are his Busch/Nationwide Series results as a car owner. But he persists with the hope that, with a little help, his team could become something more. This year, Massachusetts driver Bobby Santos III was tabbed to run Jimmy's sole Nationwide car at Daytona. They wrecked badly. And in a tremendous show of class, Dale Earnhardt, Jr. (who admits to having a longtime respect for Jimmy Means and a friendship with his son Brad) lent Jimmy's underfunded team a backup car to race Saturday.
Nothing's guaranteed in qualifying: Alli Owens clocked in eleventh fastest in practice in her one-off deal, and in the second practice session for the Trucks, rookie Cole Whitt (driving a Red Bull-sponsored truck for Stacy Compton's Turn One Racing in a last-minute full-season deal) was fastest in practice. But qualifying is the only part that actually counts. Austin Dillon matched his brother's ARCA achievement by winning the Truck Series pole in the black #3 Chevrolet. Johanna Long, making her first start at Daytona, qualified fifth. Chad McCumbee, a late replacement in a Ford owned by Chase Mattioli, qualified twentieth. Alli Owens, Cole Whitt, and Tayler Malsam (driving a second truck for Randy Moss) were instead among the drivers to go home early, none with the benefit of a guaranteed start. Joining them was Mike Skinner, who was ineligible to use his past champion's provisional because of the late entry.
Brotherly love comes through: When I saw the results of the second Gatorade Duel qualifying race from Thursday, I did a double-take. Brian Keselowski, in the unsponsored white #92 Dodge, finishing fifth? Then, I noticed that Brad Keselowski (now driving the Miller Lite #2 for Roger Penske) finished seventh. Involved in a late wreck in the qualifying race, Brad restarted deep in the field, but found his big brother and shoved him straight to the front. And so Brian Keselowski, who showed up at Daytona with a five-year-old Dodge and a used engine and a single set of tires and one crew member (his father Bob, a former ARCA champion and Truck Series driver), starts twelfth Sunday. Ray Evernham has stepped in to pick up Brian's tire bill, sponsors are talking with Brian for the race, and Roger Penske has offered a newer engine for race day. This could be the feel-good story of the week.
Even the winner couldn't go unscathed: The Truck Series race at Daytona was held Friday night, on the ten-year anniversary of Dale Earnhardt's death at Daytona in 2001. The first half of the race was predictably clean, with teammates James Buescher and Ricky Carmichael holding the lead past halfway. A few single-truck incidents slowed the race after that, and Elliott Sadler worked with Michael Waltrip to take the lead, shuffling Buescher through traffic. A blown tire for Travis Kvapil wrecked several trucks with 25 laps remaining (and several others who slowed for the wreck were damaged when Donnie Neuenberger drove into the back of Johanna Long and pushed her through the high groove), but the racing remained fast and furious. Finally, with five to go, using the two-car tandem draft that proved successful in the Cup sessions, Kyle Busch shoved unknown Chris Fontaine into the lead for a few seconds, before tight racing behind them (and Brad Sweet in a loose truck in the middle) left all but five trucks undamaged. On the restart, with two laps remaining, Sadler and Waltrip rocketed away from the remnants of the field. Coming through the fourth turn, half of Waltrip's rear spoiler came unbolted, falling flat. Waltrip pulled outside through the turn, pulled alongside Sadler and stole the win with a last-lap pass. It was Waltrip's first Truck victory, coming in a flat-black #15 Truck painted similarly to the NAPA car Waltrip had won with at Daytona the day Dale died. Ten years before. No word yet on penalties for the spoiler problem, but no one was going to take Michael's emotional victory away.
In the aftermath, Clay Rogers stole third place, courtesy of another Kyle Busch shove. Jennifer Jo Cobb recorded her best finish, coming home sixth, also the strongest finish for a woman at Daytona in any of the major three divisions and the strongest finish for a woman in the Truck Series. Jeffrey Earnhardt, grandson of Dale and son of Kerry, finished seventh. Fourteenth in a battered truck was Cole Whitt, who had jumped into Shane Sieg's truck after failing to qualify, and took the unsponsored black #93 into the top five before the wreck with five to go. Behind him by one spot was fellow rookie Parker Kligerman, who had raced the evening's sole Dodge Ram into the top five until the last big wreck.
Today, the Nationwide Series teams get their shot at the high banks of Daytona. Clint Bowyer is on the pole, with Dale Junior in his mirror, and Tony Stewart not far behind. Five Cup drivers and Danica Patrick start in the top ten. That does it for the usual, but there are bound to be some surprises in store.
After all, Bobby Santos, the Modified driver in that Jimmy Means #52 wearing the same black and silver scheme as Aric Almirola's JR Motorsports #88?
He qualified 23rd.
Sheltra finds a ride: Lately, the jump from feeder-series champ to rookie challenger has been hard for drivers who don't come as a package deal with their own sponsorship. I was going to count Patrick Sheltra in this crowd. Patrick won the 2010 ARCA Racing Series title after a couple wins and a steady season. He announced he would be moving to NASCAR for 2011, but the announcements were nowhere to be found. Meanwhile, Milka Duno (without results, but with a sponsor) tested Sheltra's car at Daytona. At last, this week Rick Ware Racing added another car to the Nationwide Series field at Daytona with Sheltra behind the wheel. Timmy Hill is scheduled to run the full season (starting at Phoenix, when he turns 18) in Ware's #15 car, so it's hard to say if the #41 will be a full-season effort for Sheltra or just a Daytona one-off. I hope he impresses.
A challenger appears: After a 2010 season in which one rookie made a full-season bid for Rookie of the Year, the 2011 ROTY campaign in Sprint Cup looked bleak. Raybestos pulled out as sponsor after 2010, and as of the start of Speedweeks, only Brian Keselowski had suggested he might run enough races to be eligible for Rookie of the Year. Some speculated Trevor Bayne may make a run for it in the Wood Brothers #21, but NASCAR squelched that talk this week stating that a driver has to run for points in the division, while Trevor is chasing the Nationwide title this year. This week, Andy Lally, driving the TRG Motorsports-sponsored Chevrolet at Daytona, signed up for the ROTY battle. I'm not sure how this will work into his road-racing schedule, but time will tell.
A local girl makes good: Last year, while ARCA broadcasters waxed poetic over Danica Patrick's stock-car debut, they glossed over a pearly-pink #15 Chevrolet running third, dismissing the driver as "what's-her-name." The girl in the pink Chevy was Alli Owens, who brought her longtime sponsor to Venturini for a partial season in 2010. With a few laps to go, she was running third until she got shuffled out of the draft and cut a tire. After the season, her sponsor (a voc-ed project backed by the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers) backed out due to the economy, leaving Alli high and dry for 2011. Still committed to race at her home track, Alli started shopping...this time, for sponsors. A few weeks before Daytona, it was confirmed that she would try to qualify a Ford truck for Ray Hackett Racing at Daytona. Local sponsors, including a chapter of the IBEW, a Daytona-area Ford dealership and even some fan contributors, signed on to back Alli's effort. In the first Truck Series practice, Alli clocked in at eleventh-fastest, the fastest Ford in the field.
Even champs struggle for rides: In 1995, Mike Skinner drove RCR's #3 Goodwrench truck to the inaugural NASCAR SuperTruck Series championship. After a lackluster 2010 season with Randy Moss Motorsports, in which Mike was critical of the involvement of his football-star team owner, it was expected (and eventually confirmed) that Mike Skinner would be looking for a 2011 ride. By the time it was confirmed, however, most of the competitive Toyota rides had been spoken for. Speculation pointed to the SS/Green Light Racing team, where David Starr had taken his sponsorship and Moss' #81 number mid-season, but nothing came up. A week before Speedweeks, Eddie Sharp (who moved his ARCA team to the Truck Series this year with Craig Goess) entered a second truck, #45, for Skinner to drive at Daytona. It's hard to believe that a driver with a winning record in the series could find, at best, a one-off deal to run at Daytona.
Junior lends a hand and a car: Jimmy Means isn't a name most people recognize. He was, in the spirit of J.D. McDuffie and Dave Marcis, an "independent," a driver who ran his own equipment without factory backing or much in the way of sponsorship. His Cup results were never much to look at. Neither are his Busch/Nationwide Series results as a car owner. But he persists with the hope that, with a little help, his team could become something more. This year, Massachusetts driver Bobby Santos III was tabbed to run Jimmy's sole Nationwide car at Daytona. They wrecked badly. And in a tremendous show of class, Dale Earnhardt, Jr. (who admits to having a longtime respect for Jimmy Means and a friendship with his son Brad) lent Jimmy's underfunded team a backup car to race Saturday.
Nothing's guaranteed in qualifying: Alli Owens clocked in eleventh fastest in practice in her one-off deal, and in the second practice session for the Trucks, rookie Cole Whitt (driving a Red Bull-sponsored truck for Stacy Compton's Turn One Racing in a last-minute full-season deal) was fastest in practice. But qualifying is the only part that actually counts. Austin Dillon matched his brother's ARCA achievement by winning the Truck Series pole in the black #3 Chevrolet. Johanna Long, making her first start at Daytona, qualified fifth. Chad McCumbee, a late replacement in a Ford owned by Chase Mattioli, qualified twentieth. Alli Owens, Cole Whitt, and Tayler Malsam (driving a second truck for Randy Moss) were instead among the drivers to go home early, none with the benefit of a guaranteed start. Joining them was Mike Skinner, who was ineligible to use his past champion's provisional because of the late entry.
Brotherly love comes through: When I saw the results of the second Gatorade Duel qualifying race from Thursday, I did a double-take. Brian Keselowski, in the unsponsored white #92 Dodge, finishing fifth? Then, I noticed that Brad Keselowski (now driving the Miller Lite #2 for Roger Penske) finished seventh. Involved in a late wreck in the qualifying race, Brad restarted deep in the field, but found his big brother and shoved him straight to the front. And so Brian Keselowski, who showed up at Daytona with a five-year-old Dodge and a used engine and a single set of tires and one crew member (his father Bob, a former ARCA champion and Truck Series driver), starts twelfth Sunday. Ray Evernham has stepped in to pick up Brian's tire bill, sponsors are talking with Brian for the race, and Roger Penske has offered a newer engine for race day. This could be the feel-good story of the week.
Even the winner couldn't go unscathed: The Truck Series race at Daytona was held Friday night, on the ten-year anniversary of Dale Earnhardt's death at Daytona in 2001. The first half of the race was predictably clean, with teammates James Buescher and Ricky Carmichael holding the lead past halfway. A few single-truck incidents slowed the race after that, and Elliott Sadler worked with Michael Waltrip to take the lead, shuffling Buescher through traffic. A blown tire for Travis Kvapil wrecked several trucks with 25 laps remaining (and several others who slowed for the wreck were damaged when Donnie Neuenberger drove into the back of Johanna Long and pushed her through the high groove), but the racing remained fast and furious. Finally, with five to go, using the two-car tandem draft that proved successful in the Cup sessions, Kyle Busch shoved unknown Chris Fontaine into the lead for a few seconds, before tight racing behind them (and Brad Sweet in a loose truck in the middle) left all but five trucks undamaged. On the restart, with two laps remaining, Sadler and Waltrip rocketed away from the remnants of the field. Coming through the fourth turn, half of Waltrip's rear spoiler came unbolted, falling flat. Waltrip pulled outside through the turn, pulled alongside Sadler and stole the win with a last-lap pass. It was Waltrip's first Truck victory, coming in a flat-black #15 Truck painted similarly to the NAPA car Waltrip had won with at Daytona the day Dale died. Ten years before. No word yet on penalties for the spoiler problem, but no one was going to take Michael's emotional victory away.
In the aftermath, Clay Rogers stole third place, courtesy of another Kyle Busch shove. Jennifer Jo Cobb recorded her best finish, coming home sixth, also the strongest finish for a woman at Daytona in any of the major three divisions and the strongest finish for a woman in the Truck Series. Jeffrey Earnhardt, grandson of Dale and son of Kerry, finished seventh. Fourteenth in a battered truck was Cole Whitt, who had jumped into Shane Sieg's truck after failing to qualify, and took the unsponsored black #93 into the top five before the wreck with five to go. Behind him by one spot was fellow rookie Parker Kligerman, who had raced the evening's sole Dodge Ram into the top five until the last big wreck.
Today, the Nationwide Series teams get their shot at the high banks of Daytona. Clint Bowyer is on the pole, with Dale Junior in his mirror, and Tony Stewart not far behind. Five Cup drivers and Danica Patrick start in the top ten. That does it for the usual, but there are bound to be some surprises in store.
After all, Bobby Santos, the Modified driver in that Jimmy Means #52 wearing the same black and silver scheme as Aric Almirola's JR Motorsports #88?
He qualified 23rd.
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