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Number of the Day
14
Age Kurt Busch began his racing career.
Ned Jarrett is the only driver to retire as the reigning Winston Cup Champion.
Check it out……
I have a new poll on the website regarding Steve Park and DEI.
Check it out. Once again you can vote once each day. Larry
http://bhb10.tripod.com/de3fan/
To Trudy:
Thanks for the pic….it made my day…LOL
from Jo
I have to comment on calling the 500 after 272.5 miles. Rain,
yes. And it was still raining heavily at 10 PM, and at midnight, and still
misting at 6 the next morning (Monday). Dampness in the air
kept things fairly wet way after noon. We were there, we sat in the rain.
But Mikey led the most laps, most likely he would have won anyhow, but
we'll never know. If they'd held the race late Monday after everything
dried, the guys wouldn't be able to continue to their next race and then
the whole schedule would be fouled up. We are in Daytona for five
days every February and since we also live in Central Florida, we know
how Florida rain is. Jo Lake Alfred, FL
from DE3FAN
Momma, I have to agree with Susie! The race should have went
the 500 miles no matter what. Afterall, they do call it the Great
American Race. We sat thru a 3 hour rain delay at Daytona in 1995
and the race continued. If they would have 'called' the race in '95,
Dale Earnhardt would have won (finished 2nd)! Whether it be Monday
or Tuesday, the Daytona 500 should run in its entirety. Would Michael
have won after 500 miles? I think not! He received a pretty
nice gift from the 'airheads' at NA$CAR and $1.4 million to boot!
Larry
Larry, sorry to disappoint ya, but I think Mikey would have won. Hands down. He let Jr. get one lap back, but I don’t think he would have let him get 2 back. Mikey wanted it too much!
The final results of the Toyota/Move Races Poll has been posted on the website listed below.
http://bhb10.tripod.com/de3fan/
from Chris
Did you happen to notice Todd Bodine wrecked another couple million
dollars worth of cars on Saturday in the Busch race? When is NASCAR
going to do a little more than slap his wrist? They parked Harvick for
spinning a truck out at 75 mph on a short track. I guess they don't
deem it dangerous when a driver runs over another car at 185 mph at Daytona.
Chris
P.S. Dale Jr. will recover from his Daytona setback.
I sure did Chris. That was the first thing out of my mouth when I was watching the race. Read on, there is a short story on that one!
Earnhardt statue to be sold on Ebay
For millions of NASCAR fans, Tuesday marks a sad anniversary. Two years
ago, racing superstar Dale Earnhardt died in a crash. To honor him, a special
likeness of the legendary NASCAR driver goes on the auction block Tuesday
night. Sculptor Nick Rosseter will offer a life-sized carving of
Earnhardt on the online auction site Ebay. Rosseter said he spent thousands
of hours carving the 450-pound white oak statue. Rosseter said he expects
the bids to start at $20,000. The artists’ other works have sold for thousands
of dollars. - News14.com
Fox's airing of Sunday's Daytona 500 drew 29.4 million viewers to make it the event's fifth-biggest audience ever, according to Nielsen Media Research. But the rain that cut the race short caused the ratings to drop from last year's record, when the race scored a 10.9/26, with 35 million total viewers. Fox says the race drew 9.8/21 overnight household rating/share. Fox noted that the race still posted the highest rating of any sporting event since Super Bowl XXXVII, easily beating events such as the NBA All-Star Game and NFL Pro Bowl. The network said initial viewership was 4 percent higher than last year's start on NBC but fell with the first rain delay.
Penske Racing South driver Ryan Newman is scheduled to test his No. 12 Dodge today and tomorrow at Atlanta Motor Speedway, and Daytona 500 winner Michael Waltrip is one of several drivers scheduled to test there on Feb. 26. Other drivers expected to attend the test are veterans Robby Gordon and Elliott Sadler and rookies Jamie McMurray, Casey Mears and Jack Sprague. The track says next week's test will be the only time this season that grandstands will be open for fans to watch testing, and no admission will be charged. The test will run from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Roush Racing driver Kurt Busch is set to join Penske Racing South driver Rusty Wallace in a 2003 VISA Card national advertising campaign. Both are schedueld to take part in a photo shoot today and a commercial shoot on Wednesday at Daytona International Speedway. Roush Racing says Wednesday's commercial part of the shoot will feature the team's No. 97 Ford and a pit crew. Busch jokes that he hasn't yet received one thing he sought in return for his work: "I asked for a million-dollar credit limit. They said they'd get back to me."
Las Vegas Motor Speedway says tickets are on sale for the Las Vegas Chapter of Speedway Children's Charities fifth annual NASCAR Driver Auction on Feb. 27 at Sam's Town Hotel & Gambling Hall in Las Vegas. Some winning bidders will ride with Winston Cup drivers in convertibles during the pre-race parade lap prior to the UAW-DaimlerChrysler 400 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway on March 2. A silent auction will feature NASCAR memorabilia and autographed collectibles, including an autographed driver uniform from pop music star Britney Spears. Drivers scheduled to participate include Jeff Green, Kurt Busch and Greg Biffle. Tony Stewart is scheduled to be on hand from 4:45 to 5 p.m. before the auction begins at 6. Tickets are $35 and are available at www.tickets.com. Tickets may also be purchased at the Sam's Town Live! box office the day of the auction if there are any still available.
Toyota won't wait until it's actually competing next year to begin supporting NASCAR's Craftsman Truck Series, according to this week's issue of Street & Smith's SportsBusiness Journal. Senior writer Bill King says the company plans to begin advertising during the truck races on Speed Channel this year. No details about the ad campaign were disclosed.
Bank building in Cannon Village Friday netted approximately $3,000 that
will go toward the completion of Dale Earnhardt Plaza. The invitation-only
event, held in conjunction with the recognition of Valentine's Day, was
coordinated through the efforts of the Kannapolis Business Council. “We
were able to sell about 85 percent of the tickets,” said Patti Rader, past
chairwoman of the business council. “We probably had close to 160 people
there.” Tickets were $100 per couple, and a large portion of the money
raised went toward the catering, open bar and entertainment. The Jerry
Goodman Orchestra, which cost $1,700, had folks dancing the night away
with it's horn-driven melodies. - The Independent Tribune
Remembering
Dale! Fans Flock To DEInc., For Tribute: Dale Earnhardt fans
from near and far gathered Tuesday at Dale Earnhardt Inc. in Mooresville
to pay their respects on the second anniversary of the racer's fatal accident
at Daytona International Speedway. At dusk, a crowd of about 150 people,
many of whom were clad in Earnhardt-related gear, stood outside the front
doors of DEI with lighted candles for a quiet time of reflection. Behind
the glass doors sat the black no. 3 Chevrolet which Earnhardt made so famous.
Hanging from the ceiling was an oversized photo of the late seven-time
Winston Cup champion wearing a tuxedo and sporting his trademark grin.
- The Independent Tribune
RacingOne Report
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. - Todd Bodine's 2003 season didn't start as he had hoped.
After being involved in a late race crash with Jimmy Vasser and Jason Keller in Saturday's Koolerz 300 Busch race at Daytona, Bodine was called into NASCAR's big red trailer.
Bodine finished last season on probation and there are indications he'll be headed back after Saturday's wreck.
The accident began whenn Bodine rammed Vasser from behind as they raced through the third turn. Vasser went sideways and quickly collected Keller and McLaughlin.
Bodine left the NASCAR meeting visibly shaken and upset over the day's events..
"I tried to be patient and run a clean race, and I run right into him,'' said Bodine, his voice breaking with emotion. "I don't blame anybody, but he let off. I did nothing wrong. I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time.
"The tape shows I ran into him, and I did, but a lot of things had to
happen for me to get into him. It wasn't like I just ran right into the
back of him. It really hurts to have people think of me this way.''
STEVE BRISENDINE
Associated Press
KANSAS CITY, Mo. - One way or another, there will be more fans in the seats for Winston Cup action at Kansas Speedway in 2004.
The track in Kansas City, Kan., joined by government and civic groups on both sides of the state line, is pushing hard for a second Cup date when NASCAR reshuffles its schedule for 2004.
But if a second date doesn't materialize, track president Jeff Boerger said, the 2-year-old speedway will expand again after this season. Kansas Speedway added 1,500 seats in the offseason after its second straight sellout year, bringing its capacity to 78,000, and has already sold out its 2003 season-ticket package.
"We could go, if the market would let us, to 150,000. We have the infrastructure in place for that," Boerger said Monday.
Last week, he and other officials presented the track's case to its parent company, Daytona, Fla.-based International Speedway Corp. ISC is owned by the family of NASCAR owner Bill France.
"Who knows when there's going to be another opportunity to get another race?" said Steve Kelly, the Kansas Department of Commerce's director of business development and a member of the "Project Blitz" team trying to land a second race. "When you get the opportunity, you'd better make a run at it."
NASCAR's realignment could include moving races between tracks but likely won't involve additional dates. That means one of the circuit's older tracks - perhaps Darlington Raceway or North Carolina Speedway in Rockingham, both of which now have two races a year - could lose their Cup dates.
Atlanta Motor Speedway and Lowe's Motor Speedway in Charlotte, N.C., both owned by Speedway Motorsports Inc., have also been mentioned as candidates to have Cup races taken away. Each of those tracks has two Cup dates each year, and Lowe's also hosts the Winston all-star event.
But Kansas City isn't the only ISC track looking for a second date, and SMI's Texas Motor Speedway has long argued that NASCAR has never given a second date as promised when the $250 million track opened in 1997.
"Within ISC, I would say our competition is probably going to be between Phoenix, California and Chicago," Boerger said. "And you know, Darlington is not just going to give us a second date. They're going to give us a challenge."
The speedway's close relationship with the state, the Unified Government of Wyandotte County and Kansas City, Kan., and the city's Board of Public Utilities should give it an edge, Boerger said.
"I do believe we have the fan base to sell out a second Cup weekend," he said. "Then we also have that strong public-private partnership, which can assemble a strong incentive package to attract that second weekend."
Selling out the track's first two Winston Cup races hasn't been a problem, at least.
The season-ticket package at Kansas Speedway, which covers Indy Racing League and NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series races in July and a full Busch Series/Winston Cup weekend in October, sold out in January - 45 days earlier than the sellout date in 2001.
Tickets for an ARCA event in June are sold separately.
The track's success at selling tickets, however, could be offset by Kansas City's perceived "small-market" status.
Kansas City is the nation's 33rd-largest television market, according to the 2003 edition of Bacon's TV/Cable Directory. By comparison, Los Angeles is No. 2, Chicago is No. 3, the Dallas-Fort Worth area is No. 7 and Phoenix is No. 16.
"I know we're only 33rd, but we're surrounded by top 100 markets and we get a lot of ticket holders from those markets," track spokeswoman Sammie Lukaskiewicz said. "We've got St. Louis at (No.) 22, Oklahoma City at 45, Tulsa (Okla.) at 60, Wichita (Kan.) at 66, Des Moines (Iowa) at 72, Springfield, Missouri, at 73, Omaha (Neb.) at 78 and Cedar Rapids (Iowa) at 88."
On the Net: http:/www.kansasspeedway.com
Earnhardt's Mark
Dale Earnhardt and Daytona will be forever linked -- because of both his success on the track and his death there two years ago today. Now, his team's success at Daytona keeps his legacy alive. Dale Earnhardt Inc.'s Michael Waltrip, who won the race in which Earnhardt was killed, scored another Daytona 500 win Sunday. And though he didn't win, Dale Earnhardt Jr. dominated the rest of Speedweeks.
Earnhardt Jr. helped Waltrip
win
Associated Press
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- The father would have known how the son felt.
Dale Earnhardt Sr. would have been proud, too, to see the way Junior
handled his bad luck
Sunday and helped a teammate win the Daytona 500.
Dale Earnhardt Jr. came to Daytona feeling he still had something to prove -- to fans, to the rest of the racing world, maybe a little to himself. He wanted to be taken seriously as a driver, not be seen as a star in name only who loved the fast life more than the fast lane.
He left without the big trophy but not without making his point.
Junior outdrove everyone with three victories during Speedweeks, only to get stopped Sunday by the simplest of problems -- a dead battery. A $100,000 car with a lousy $100 part.
His dad would have empathized. One year he lost the Daytona 500 by running into a seagull. Another year he cut a tire on the last lap.
What would have pleased his father immensely was the way his son, two laps back, roared ahead on the inside to help teammate Michael Waltrip draft into the lead past Jimmie Johnson on the 106th lap.
It was a sloppy, choppy race, this rain-soaked Daytona 272½ that ended under a caution after just 109 of the scheduled 200 laps. But it was huge for Dale Earnhardt Inc., for Waltrip and, in a way, for Junior, who had led from the 43rd lap to the 64th before his battery failed.
If he couldn't win, he could at least help his friend and teammate with the kind of move that serious drivers make.
In winning the Busch Series race Saturday, Earnhardt looked as if he were cruising in the country, not bothered by the havoc behind him. There was fire and smoke, spinouts and crashes, and for all anyone could tell, he could have been singing along with songs on the radio as he took the lead on lap 54 and stayed in front the rest of the way.
He was the same in the 500, enjoying views of the race on the five Jumbotrons around the track while he was ahead.
"It bugs me,'' he said of the way fans and critics perceived him. "But you've got to know me to understand where I came from and how I came to become a driver and how I've watched the sport eat other people alive. It may eat me alive, but I'm going to win my races and try to go get my championship. I ain't going to get an ulcer over it.''
Junior got nothing handed to him as a kid and his father was more often traveling than staying home to coach him. When Junior and his half-brother, Kerry, decided to be drivers, they had to prove themselves on their own. They got their fingernails dirty, built their own cars, put together their own crews and raced around North Carolina short tracks.
Their father encouraged them, helping out with used equipment, but didn't make it too easy. Yet Dale Sr. couldn't have been prouder than when Junior won his first Winston Cup race, hugging his son and smiling and saying it felt better than anything he, himself, had ever won.
When Junior says he saw the sport "eat other people alive'' he means drivers who had talent and no sponsors, or sponsors and no luck. He means his father, the greatest driver in Daytona history, who didn't win the 500 until his 20th start in 1998, finishing second five times before that.
Junior was a teenager when his father led the 500 until cutting a tire on a piece of metal with half a lap to go. Earnhardt limped home fifth as Derrike Cope grabbed the victory.
"It hurt,'' Earnhardt Jr. said. "Those were tough, tough times. It was awful.''
The Intimidator, for all his popularity and all the sympathy his hard luck won him, agonized about it until he finally won the Daytona 500 -- three years before he was killed at 49 in a collision on the last lap.
Whatever happened in his own career, however the luck played out and the public perceived him, Junior was determined not to let it give him an ulcer. Still, he couldn't ignore it.
"When you read in a magazine that people say, 'Well, if he matures and he goes after it, he can get it.' It upsets me that I don't have that perception already,'' he said after the Busch victory. "But it's hard to change that. It's something you won't change overnight. And it was my attitude in creating some kind of partying persona that's failed me a little bit now.''
Junior's "Club E'' in his basement, his love of a good time and touch of a wild streak, gave some people the impression he wasn't as serious about being a great driver as he was about being a star. He reinforced the image last week by agreeing to be the guest celebrity photographer for Playboy.com at a session with former Playmates Erica, Nicole and Jaclyn Dahm.
It was the same kind of commercially inspired "image is everything'' rap that Andre Agassi had to overcome from his early years in tennis. Agassi outgrew that perception, becoming a player and a man of substance. Earnhardt has already begun to do the same.
RACING PERSPECTIVES
Instant Replay: Bad Call on Marlin
By Ryan Seek - Guest Contributor
Instant Replay. It's not an uncommon picture; some NFL zebra cowering under the hood of a replay camera while a clock is ticking, hoping his high-pressure decision doesn't go against all common sense and he is later subjected to a public thrashing not seen since the last time Kurt Busch went down pit road.
If NASCAR is going to initiate a rule as subjective as their "out-of-bounds"
rule at Daytona and
Talladega, they need to present the man responsible for that decision so
we know who to aim our spoiled refrigerator items at.
NASCAR has its own faceless version of that trembling head official, somewhere up there in the maze of media suites atop the front grandstands. Not unlike his football counterpart, he probably has one lap to make his decision. I am sure he is thankful to be encased in plaster and glass and not out there in a position where fans can start pelting him with $5 cans of un-opened beer.
What am I getting at?
That penalty assessed to Sterling Marlin in Sunday's Daytona 500 was one big crock of steaming donkey dung.
Forget the fact that Mike Helton himself said in the driver's meeting that anyone who appeared to be over-aggressively blocking their competitors below the yellow line would also be subject to a penalty. Elliott Sadler's move on the race track at the moment in question would certainly fall under the realms of Helton's above-mentioned rule.
But Elliott wasn't blocking; he was simply trying to get out of everyone's way while he switched to the back-up ignition after the engine had failed...thanks to the FOX broadcast crew for picking up on that little tidbit of information.
It "just so happened" that Sterling was moving up a wide-open bottom lane in the backstretch when Sadler's little power-hiccup occurred. Within a blink of an eye, Elliott cut his Ford a lane-and-a-half to the inside while that M&M on the back bumper screamed at decibel levels far beyond that of the exhaust pipes. Sterling had to Dodge (no pun intended) below the yellow line to avoid becoming a whirling dervish like Bobby Labonte just a few laps earlier.
And he get's penalized for that? Bullspit.
Just from the snippet of video that FOX was able to catch of the incident, it was perfectly clear that Sadler's car moved down suddenly just as Sterling's car was rocketing up the inside.
This is a prime example of two experienced drivers doing what they thought was best to avoid an end result of screeching rubber and crashing metal. It's hard to believe anyone could actually be penalized for that.
By the rules stated in the driver's meeting on Sunday, BOTH drivers could or should have been penalized. In this case, I don't believe either driver should have had the black nylon waving in their face. Instead, they should have been awarded the Insert Sponsor Here Move Of The Race for their awesome reflexes under sudden unexpected conditions.
If NASCAR continues with this bully-mentality of enforcing their "out-of-bounds" rule, drivers may be forced to make decisions that could create more problems than the rule was designed to avoid.
In concept, the "out-of-bounds" rule has definite merit. But the way they enforce it leaves a little to be desired.
You can reach Ryan Seek at: rseek@...
Your
Momma
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