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NASCAR Sprint-Cup Series
JENSEN: NASCAR Answerman - Raceday Edition
By popular demand, The NASCAR Answerman returns on SPEEDtv.com with today's Daytona 500 Raceday Edition...
Tom Jensen  |  Posted February 15, 2009   Daytona Beach, FL
The NASCAR Answerman on SPEEDtv.com - The Online Motorsports Authority

Note: By popular demand, The NASCAR Answerman returns for 2009 on SPEEDtv.com. I will be answering questions every week and look forward to hearing from you as the season goes on. And by the way, thanks for the e-mails of support. – Tom Jensen

How many Daytona 500s have been run at a distance of other than 500 miles? Jodi G. — Parsippany, N.J.

For this answer, I have to give a big Answerman shout out to Denny Darnell at Dodge Motorsports for providing the correct answer, which is seven. Three Daytona 500s were shortened by rain: 1965, 322.5 miles; 1966, 495 miles; and the shortest of all was in 2003, when Michael Waltrip won after just 272.5 miles. The 1974 Daytona was scheduled for 450 miles (180 laps) or 90 percent distance in response to the energy crisis sweeping the United States at the time; scoring began on lap 20. The three Daytona 500s from 2005-07 all were lengthened because of green-white-checker finish rule.

And to answer a question from reader Mark Petovic, no Daytona 500 has ever been rained out. Yet. I’m hoping that doesn’t change today

Who exactly is responsible for continuing to force junk rubber for NASCAR and is there an e-mail address for them? Do you expect ANY of the other owners to man-up with Tony Stewart in an effort to stop the expense of crashing cars because of the tires in question before someone gets hurt? — Johnny Moore

Thanks for the question, Johnny. Goodyear has a contract with NASCAR to be the exclusive tire supplier in the top three NASCAR series through the 2012 season. Believe me, the teams and drivers put an enormous amount of pressure on Goodyear — some public and some private — to get the best tires possible. To its credit, after an abysmal spring race at Atlanta Motor Speedway last year, Goodyear tested there again and came up with a much better combination for the fall race.

In terms of Stewart, he was understandably angry and frustrated at losing both his Daytona 500 car and teammate Ryan Newman’s. According to Goodyear, Newman’s tire failure happen because he ran over something on the track and cut his tire, not because of blistering or wear. And if that was indeed the case, it wouldn’t have mattered what brand of tire Newman was on if he ran over something that cut his tire.


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