Start-crash-restart-crash-restart-crash-restart-crash. Repeat a few more times.
Unbelievable race, with an unbelievable finish. The race was won today by the youngest driver ever to win the Daytona 500, Trevor Baine. It was only his second start in a NASCAR Sprint Cup car. He had finished 17th at Texas last year, his only other start. He was driving for a part time team, The Wood Brothers Racing Team. A team running mostly on their own money. No big sponsors, no giant shop with multiple backup cars. No multiple engines around to swap out at the blink of an eye. They had 1 backup car and one engine at the track. No team coaches or team weight and health conditioners standing by to see if they can shave a half a second off the pit times. Just a bunch of low paid, or no paid guys out there flinging tires and wrenches around, and they beat ALL the other teams that DO have those things on NASCARS biggest stage.
Those of you that read this blog and don't get NASCAR, take note. That's why NASCAR is the most popular sport around. You can take a fast car, some money, a good driver and go to the track and race with the biggest names around. And you can win. You CAN beat the highest earning, the fastest cars, the biggest teams, and the most popular drivers at the track.
The driver we like, Tony Stewart, ran up front all day. Finished the race in 13th place with an intact car. He sustained very little damage to have been actively involved in 2 of the wrecks that occured. Jimmy Johnson, Jeff Gordon and Kevin Harvick did not fair so well. Harvick blew an engine early (which is a good thing)(sorry Jeffro) and watched the race from the motorhome. Johnson and Gordon both got caught up in a wreck around lap 30. It was just the first race of the season and they will all be back next week, suited up and ready to race at Phoenix .
The race today broke records also:
The most lead changes
The most cautions
The youngest driver to ever win
2012 Daytona 500 fact. Next year the race season will start one week later than in previous years. They are making the season shorter and also it will allow all the NFL Super Bowl hoopla to get over with.
4 comments:
You are right. NASCAR is America's Sport. Not only to watch, but who hasn't raced some sort of device in his life themselves?
That was one heck of a race and you couldn't ask for a better finish. I spent most of the day bragging on the 21 cars ability to push anyone to the front. His weakness was the restart. Don't know how he stayed up front but he did an awesome job.
Congrats Trevor!
I was very sad to see Harvick out early but these things happen! It was a great race though and I really enjoyed it!!!!
Jeffro
I wish Fox had said more about the magnitude of the Wood Brothers' achievement here. They haven't been relevant in a long time and it's a miracle they are still in the game at all. And I loved it that they won.
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