Worst to First In Shootout Shoot-Outs
Not that most people didn’t believe the hype, but Dale Earnhardt Junior put
himself as the overwhelming favorite for the Daytona 500 with a scintillating
performance in the Daytona Shootout. Other teams viewing their tapes of the
race, though, may see the key to beating Junior – getting into the corners;
where Junior could kill everyone was entering the turns, particularly on the
bottom – not that he was deficient up top, though.
The inverted-by-draw field saw worst to first and worst to second – Earnhardt
started last and won, while Jeff Gordon started near-last, led some 30 laps, and
finished second. First, meanwhile, was worst, as Geoff Bodine all but never got
off the line and went to the garage.
As expected, Chevy dominated, but Dodge gave a decent accounting highlighted
by Ken Schrader’s unsung heroism going for the win in Liz Morgenthau’s #49; Ford
showed that in the draft it can fly but has more trouble than the Chevys out
front – Kurt Busch’s best moves came in traffic, while Matt Kenseth passed
Junior but couldn’t stay out front that long. Pontiac, meanwhile, had one car in
the Shootout – Ricky Craven – and Craven was losing the front end the longer the
night went.
We got some solid answers about NASCAR’s aero-matching and
weight-distribution rules with the Shootout – both worked. The draft was noticeably
stronger this time around than in the last two Daytona trips, and the lead
changed hands 13 official times and about three or four additional times – the
passing at times rivaled the amount of passing in the next day’s Arena Football
games. The draft was strong enough that as expected the required green flag stop
didn’t break up the pack, further illustrating the pointlessness of the idea
behind the 13-gallon cell.
Handling, meanwhile, was an issue – Ryan Newman’s handling wasn’t to his
liking – but it wasn’t enough that the cars racing Junior didn’t have a shot;
Craven for one made a nice save in Two despite deteriorating overall handling
and was strong start to finish.
So with the first live-fire engagement of the season, NASCAR 2003 has begun,
and it looks like it will be an exciting season.
Before the Shootout came the ARCA 200, and Chase Montgomery cut a notch for
his future big-league plans with the win. The best racing of the ARCA race was
outside the top five, often three abreast. Christian Fittipaldi and Tim Steele
provided some of the best sparks – Fittipaldi handled himself well when swamped
by two lines of cars, while Tim Steele’s Dodge showed some muscle and Steele
made a couple of brilliant up-the-middle passes.
There were several crashes, the biggest of which was touched off by a very
minor brush by Christi Passmore, which sent herself and three others into the
wall. The experience gap that is inevitable in ARCA showed rather graphically;
the fact that it was Daytona also contributed; at Talladega there isn’t as much
attention and hype, hence the much cleaner run for ARCA last October.
The other ladies in the field made no impact. Deborah Renshaw ran
competitively last October in Bob Schacht’s #75, but this time she didn’t come
close to living up to the somewhat fawning write-up she got in USA Today; she
got lapped by three-quarters through. Shawna Robinson, meanwhile, blew up.
The unsung hero of the ARCA 200 was Greg Sacks. The former Firecracker 400
and Talladega 300 winner finished in the top ten after not making much noise
leading up to the race. While Winston Cup and Grand National is clearly no
longer in the cards for the Mod Tour’s former Ernie Wilsburg Superman, Sacks
nonetheless had a good day.
Trivia bit – who won the Daytona 125s of 1968?
The answer is related to the Sunday rainout of pole trials, a rarity in
Daytona history. The rainout may cause some renewed controversy over NASCAR’s
scheduling with its lack of bye-weeks; some will cite the September 2001
postponement of the New Hampshire 300 to November and also the near-thing that
were both the 2002 New Hampshire 300 and that same season’s Dixie 500.
The Sunday rainout also eliminated second-round qualifying, Daytona being the
only remaining race that runs more than one round of time trials. No doubt a
number of teams will be sweating more than they otherwise would come the 125s,
as they will have to race into the 500 without the safety net of a second shot
at posting a strong qualifying speed.
Does three straight years constitute a trend?
The Daytona Shootout in its 70-lap format has yet to produce one live-fire
caution, and the last crash to occur in the race was on the final lap of 2000.
The event since 1991 has been almost entirely clean & green – no live-fire
yellows 1992-4, none 1996-7, none in 1999, and none from 2001 onward.
Contrast that with The Winston since 1992.
One rumor has it that NASCAR will not wind tunnel test cars after Daytona.
That’s showing confidence in the new aero-matching. However, as the season wears
on the honeymoon will inevitably end, so no one should be shocked when each make
goes to the tunnel after a race.