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The NASCAR action from Daytona International Speedway heats up on SPEED with Live coverage of Bud Shootout practice at 4 pm ET on Friday, February 8th leading up to the Bud Shootout on Friday evening at 8 pm ET on FOX. (Jonathan Ferrey/Getty Images Photo) ยป More Photos
On location for Speedweeks at Daytona International Speedway, SPEEDtv.com's Tom Jensen blogs the latest news heading into the 50th running of the Daytona 500. Check back for updates and don't forget to leave your comments below!
Blog Post: Sunday, February 17, 2008 at 11:39 am ET
Former NASCAR Sprint Cup crew chief Michael “Fatback” McSwain was in the garage at Daytona International Speedway on Sunday, looking for work, but not the kind he used to do when he was atop the pit box for drivers like Bobby Labonte and Ricky Rudd.
McSwain, a devoutly religious man and the father of two young children, decided last year that he wanted to get off the crew chief treadmill and the savage grind of 38 races per year and day after day of testing.
To that end, he’s become something of a jack-of-all-trades, doing some media work – he’s looking for more – auctioning memorabilia on eBay and other odds and ends.
“I’m doing a little bit of everything, anything I can do to generate income,” said McSwain. “I’m in the process of building a tire store and front-end alignment shop in Dallas, N.C. I’ve been doing a little bit of TV stuff, some one-off shows, some fill-in work. … Anything I can do to generate enough income to stay home with my family.”
McSwain was optimistic about the next phase of his life. “It’s a big, old world, there’s a lot of opportunities out there,” he said. “I started in this business at the bottom, so I’ll start my next venture at the bottom.”
Blog Post: Sunday, February 17, 2008 at 8:25 am ET
GO TIME It’s race morning here in Daytona Beach, and a beautiful Sunday morning it is – hot, sunny weather with temperatures forecast to be in the low 80-degree range, with variable winds from 10 to 20 miles per hour. In short, it should be a perfect day for racing.
The big issue down here? It remains tires, just as it’s been for Speedweeks. NASCAR officials said yesterday that they don’t expect tire wear to be an issue in the Daytona 500, but the teams are still deeply concerned about whether they’ll be able to make a full fuel run – 40-44 green-flag laps of racing – without chewing up their tires. In Saturday’s Nationwide Series race there were many blistered right-side tires.
Tire management will be one key to victory today. The other will be finding a car to work with at money time. Tony Stewart won the Nationwide race Saturday because his teammate Kyle Busch stayed glued to his bumper in the race’s closing laps. Conversely, Dale Earnhardt Jr. lost the race because he couldn’t get consistent drafting help at the end.
Stewart summed it up this way, while discussing the battle between his Joe Gibbs Racing team and Hendrick Motorsports. “We’ve got three good cars in our camp, they’ve got four good cars on their side. It’s about as even as you can ask. (The Gatorade Duels) were proof. You give us 3:1 odds and it works in our favor, just as easy as it works in theirs. There’s safety in numbers. That’s the sad part about it. That’s the disappointing part, is that that’s what this race has come down to. This race has not come down to great individual performances, it’s come to sheer numbers.”
MOTORING ON NASCAR tested about 10 different NASCAR Sprint Cup engines following last Thursday’s Gatorade Duel 150 qualifying races at Daytona International Speedway.
According to several officials from NASCAR, the manufacturers who race in the Sprint Cup Series and race teams, all of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity, all parties involved are satisfied that the engines from Toyota, General Motors, Dodge and Ford are competitive with each other in terms of horsepower.
Most of the engines tested varied by less than 10 horsepower, multiple sources told SPEEDTV.com, with all but two of the engines within 7-8 horsepower of each other. And none of the four brands tested had a consistent advantage over the others. Media reports on Saturday that Toyotas had a 30-horsepower advantage over the Chevrolets were, to say the least, erroneous.
Had that actually been the case, Chevrolet teams would have been raising a ruckus with NASCAR and complaining bitterly to the media about being at a competitive disadvantage. Nothing of the sort has happened.
Blog Post: Saturday, February 16, 2008 at 11:45 am ET
HISTORY LESSON Talk with any NASCAR driver from the youngest to the oldest about Daytona International Superspeedway, and they’ll all remember one thing
“In 1959, they didn’t have testing and that kind of stuff,” said Richard Petty, who won both the Daytona 500 and the series championship seven times each. “When we came through the tunnel, I was a 21-year-old kid who probably ran 10-12 races in my lifetime. To come down here to run the biggest race there was, there was one building in the infield, they had enough grandstands for probably 20-25,000 people. And that was it. And it looked like it was forever down into the first and second corner, because there was nothing to tell you how far it was.”
Marvin Panch, the 1961 winner, said the track was nothing like the tiny bullrings stock-car racers were used to racing on in the Southeast. “When we pulled in the pits and got ready to go practice, the guys were standing around saying, ‘Wow, this is a big quarter mile,’” said Panch.
Three-time Daytona 500 winner Jeff Gordon was another driver awed by his first visit to the track. “I don’t know how to put that into words. I just remember the very first time that I ever drove through the tunnel to come here and test the Busch car and how in awe – of course the track is legendary and has a lot of history, but you really have no idea until you drive through that tunnel and see the steep banking and just an incredible race track,” said Gordon. “That first experience to me is what set the tone and every single time I drive through that tunnel I get that same feeling that I did the very first time.”
THREE-PEAT? It’s been a full three decades since anyone has won three consecutive NASCAR Cup championships, something Jimmie Johnson will be attempting this season. And if he’s successful, that won’t upset Cale Yarborough, the last man to accomplish it. “Evidently, it’s pretty hard to do, because nobody had done it before, and I’m surprised nobody’s done it since,” said Yarborough, who won championships from 1976-78 with Junior Johnson. “Jimmie is running good, he has a good team and he’s a good race-car driver. Eventually, somebody will do it, and if Jimmie does it, it will suit me just fine.”
POPULARITY CONTEST Fans can now log onto www.mostpopulardriver.com and vote for the Chex Most Popular Driver award. Last season, NASCAR fan favorite Dale Earnhardt Jr. earned his fifth consecutive Chex Most Popular Driver Award, which is administered by the National Motorsports Press Association (NMPA). Earnhardt Jr. is one of only four drivers to have won the award three or more times, joining Bill Elliott, Bobby Allison and Richard Petty. Only Earnhardt Jr., Petty and Elliot have won the award five consecutive times since the inception of the award in 1953. Fans can vote once a day, every day for over 40 of their favorite NASCAR Sprint Cup stars. Voting continues throughout the season and will conclude Nov. 17 at 11:59 PM CST. The winner will be announced at the NASCAR NMPA Myers Brothers Luncheon in New York City in December.
Blog Post: Friday, February 15, 2008 at 1:31 pm ET
Teamwork is an overused cliché in sports, but it likely will be the difference in who wins Sunday’s 50th running of the Daytona 500 and who loses it. And it’s not just teamwork in the sense of who performs the best pit stops and who has a sound strategy.
NASCAR’s first Daytona races with the new-generation car have shown conclusively that who wins a race depends on who’s behind them, using the aerodynamic benefits of the draft to push them faster together than either car could race alone. Already, that’s been shown definitively on two occasions.
With Hendrick Motorsports teammates Jeff Gordon and Jimmie Johnson pushing him, Dale Earnhardt, Jr. was able to effectively fend off Tony Stewart in Saturday night’s Bud Shootout.
In the Shootout, Stewart had just one other Joe Gibbs Racing teammate in the field, Denny Hamlin, and he was separated from Stewart late in the race, unable to team up with him in the draft.
Conversely, Hamlin and Stewart finished 1-2 in the second Gatorade Duel 150 qualifying race on Thursday, when there were three JGR Toyotas in the race and only Gordon from the Hendrick camp. And that was the proof Stewart needed to believe teamwork will determine the winner in Sunday’s big race. “You saw what happened when it was three of us and only one of them,” Stewart said.
So look for teammates to look for each other late in the race on Sunday, when the Daytona 500 is on the line and winning time is at hand.
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