CUP: Sunday Daytona Notebook (UPDATE 5)

Sprint Cup

CUP: Sunday Daytona Notebook (UPDATE 5)

Danica Patrick earned an historic pole position in the Daytona 500...

Tom Jensen | Posted February 17, 2013 Daytona Beach, FL

Danica Patrick and Jeff Gordon will start on the front row in the 2013 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Daytona 500 at Daytona International Speedway. (Photo: LAT Photographic)

Other Speedweeks 2013 Notebooks
SATURDAY, FEB. 16
FRIDAY, FEB. 15
THURSDAY, FEB. 14

[SUNDAY 4:34 pm ET]

NASCAR Daytona 500 post-qualifying notes:

Coors Light Pole Winner: Danica Patrick

Age: 30

Team : No. 10 - GoDaddy Chevrolet

Owner: Gene Haas

Crew Chief: Tony Gibson

Danica Patrick won the Coors Light Pole Award for the Daytona 500 with a lap of 45.817 seconds, 196.434 mph.

Patrick is the first female driver to win a pole in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series.

Janet Guthrie previously held the record for top starting position by a female NASCAR Sprint Cup Series driver, twice starting ninth in 1977. She started ninth at Talladega Superspeedway on Aug. 7, 1977 and at Bristol Motor Speedway on Aug. 28, 1977.

The previous best starting position for a female in the Daytona 500 was 18th by Janet Guthrie in 1980.

This is Patrick’s second NASCAR pole, also winning the Coors Light Pole for the season-opening NASCAR Nationwide Series race at Daytona last season.

Patrick, who is running for the 2013 Sunoco Rookie of the Year Award, is the first rookie to win the Daytona 500 pole since Jimmie Johnson in 2002.

Patrick is the 11th different pole winner in the last 11 Daytona 500s. It was the fastest Daytona 500 pole-winning speed since 1990.

Jeff Gordon (second) posted his 26th top-10 start in 41 races at Daytona International Speedway.

This is the fourth time Gordon has started on the front row for the Daytona 500. He won the pole in 1999 and started second in 2006 and 2011.

[SUNDAY 4:30 pm ET]
VIDEO: DAYTONA 500 QUALIFYING

[SUNDAY 3:16 pm ET]

It’s official: Danica Patrick is the first woman to ever win a pole in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series and wins it in the biggest race of the season, the Daytona 500. This pretty much ensures that next week at Daytona will be a total and absolute media circus.

Still, congrats to Patrick on her history-making run, already one of the biggest sports stories of the year — not just in NASCAR. She set the pace with a lap of 196.434 miles per hour in the No. 10 Stewart-Haas Racing/GoDaddy.com Chevrolet SS.

Starting second in the Daytona 500 will be four-time series champion Jeff Gordon, who ran 196.292 mph in his No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports Chevy SS, which is sponsored by the AARP’s Drive To End Hunger.

The rest of the 500 starting lineup will be set in Thursday’s Budweiser Duel 150 qualifying races, which will be televised live on SPEED at 1 p.m. ET with NASCAR Race Day.

[SUNDAY 2:32 pm ET]

Jeff Gordon cranks up a lap of 196.292 mph to knock Ryan Newman off the outside of Row 1 of the Daytona 500 as two-thirds of the cars have now made qualifying attempts. Since only the top two spots are locked in, Gordon’s run was significant.

[SUNDAY 2:21 pm ET]

With more than half the field already having made their qualifying attempts, Danica Patrick is still on the pole for the Daytona 500 and is threatening to be the first woman to win a pole in a NASCAR Sprint Cup race. The previous best was Janet Guthrie, who qualified ninth, twice, in 1977.

Danica Patrick is now full-time in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series. (Photo: LAT Photographic)

Twenty-seven cars have qualified so far, with Stewart-Haas Racing drivers Patrick, Ryan Newman and Tony Stewart in the top three spots right now.

[SUNDAY 2:18 pm ET]

PHOTOS: DAYTONA 500 QUALIFYING

[SUNDAY 1:28 pm ET]

Believe the hype. Danica Patrick goes out eighth of 45 Daytona 500 qualifiers and runs the second-fastest restrictor-plate lap in Daytona International Speedway history at 196.434 miles per hour. That vaults her to the top of the speed charts, although it’s still early on. Still, she looks like a strong threat for the pole.

[SUNDAY 10:20 am ET]

While Kevin Harvick was the big winner in Saturday night’s Sprint Unlimited at Daytona International Speedway, the big losers were Kurt Busch and Mark Martin — but not because of anything they did themselves.

Sparks fly from the back of the No. 55 Aaron's Dream Machine Toyota, driven by Mark Martin, during the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Sprint Unlimited at Daytona International Speedway. (Photo: Getty Images)

Busch and Martin were each caught in wrecks not of their own making both in practice on Friday and the race on Saturday. And two torn-up race cars at the start of Speedweeks can put any team in a deep hole that can take weeks or even months to dig their way out of.

“Two days, two wrecked cars and only a few laps completed,” said Busch, the 2011 race winner. “It's been a disappointing start to say the least. But the good news is that we've had fast cars. If our luck can change we'll be competitive for the big show in next week's Daytona 500 … Of course I'm disappointed, but I also feel bad for the entire Furniture Row team for all the hard work they put into this superspeedway program and delivering fast cars.”

“I'm going to take out my frustrations on the weights this morning,” Martin Tweeted Sunday morning.

[SUNDAY 8:17 am ET]

ROLL FOR THE POLL - Today’s only on-track activity at Daytona International Speedway is Daytona 500 qualifying, which begins at 1 p.m. ET and will be televised live on FOX and FOX Deportes. Each driver gets two qualifying laps, with the second almost always being the faster of the two, because it takes so long for the cars to get up to speed.

Here’s where it gets tricky: Qualifying on Sunday only locks in the front row — the fastest driver becomes the Daytona 500 pole-sitter and the second-fastest will sit on the outside of Row 1 for the race.

• Positions 3-32 will be determined Thursday, Feb. 21 during the Budweiser Duel 150 qualifying races, which will be televised live on SPEED starting with NASCAR Race Day at 1 p.m. ET.

• Positions 33-36 will be the four fastest drivers in Sunday’s qualifying session who failed to lock themselves during the Budweiser Duel.

• Positions 37-42 go to the six cars that didn’t qualify yet but had the highest number of owner points from 2012.

• The 43rd and final spot is reserved for a past NASCAR Sprint Cup champion who failed to qualify for the race. If no past champion needs the final slot, it will go to the next highest car in 2012 owner points.

VIDEO: Harvick Wins - Sprint Unlimited

PHOTOS FROM THE SPRINT UNLIMITED

Wreck Gallery

Race Gallery

Kevin Harvick Wins

Tom Jensen is the Editor in Chief of SPEED.com, Senior NASCAR Editor at RACER and a contributing Editor for TruckSeries.com. You can follow him online at twitter.com/tomjensen100.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Tom Jensen

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