bob jennings' WORLD O' RACING 02/26/2000
Outstanding job car 88, but you were too good
Mark Martin in the 1999 "Brickyard 400"
Bob Jennings
I already used up my supply of Dale Jarrett photos with an earlier piece I did about NASCAR's growth. Therefore I'm going to have to substitute a photo of Mark Martin in the 1999 "Brickyard 400" with this piece, which focuses on Jarrett's impressive third victory in the "Daytona 500;" talk about stretching associations. Hey what can I do? I don't go to many NASCAR races. Sorry Dale. Sorry Mark. Oh well, in my mind Mark Martin was Dale Jarrett's toughest competition last Sunday at Daytona so what the hell.
I think it can be written without too much disagreement the 42nd Daytona 500" wasn't one of the classic runnings of the event. There were only four on-track passes for the lead during the entire race. However even with the lack of excitement in the new millennium edition of the "Great American Race," it was still a big deal and it left me emotionally spent as it always does.
When you stack this race up with some of the classic runnings of the "Daytona 500," it doesn't compare too well. There weren't any final lap passes or crashes at the finish line. There wasn't a photo finish like the inaugural "Daytona 500" in 1959, when Lee Petty had to wait a couple days for a scoring check to be completed to see if he had beaten Johnny Beauchamp. Memories of Cale Yarborough chasing down leader Lee Roy Yarbrough with three laps remaining in the 1968 race, after Cale had fallen a lap down at 100 laps, were just that - memories. There wasn't a Petty - Pearson smash up coming to the checkered flag like in 1976. Cale and Donnie Allison weren't "duking" it out in turn three after taking each other out of the race on the backstretch on the final lap like in the 1979 "Daytona 500." Father and son Bobby and Davey Allison weren't racing to the line for the win like in 1988. Darrell Waltrip wasn't asking the heavens to confirm he had finally won the "Daytona 500" like in 1989. Dale Earnhardt wasn't doing donuts in the grass after ending 20 years of frustration in the "Daytona 500" like in 1998. Jeff Gordon wasn't taking the bet that Rusty Wallace would back off rather than let he and Ricky Rudd become names in the obituary section of the newspaper like in the 1999 "Daytona 500." The 2000 "Daytona 500" wasn't one of those kinds of races. This was essentially just a relatively safe, clean motor race with only 24 laps under caution. There were few surprises from what most people expected going into race day.
Dale Earnhardt was correct when he complained about the aerodynamic advantage the Ford Taurus had over the new Chevrolet Monte Carlo at Daytona this time. Everything Earnhardt said about the issue proved to be valid. In fact this race was hardly a contest between makes but rather a contest about who had the fastest Taurus. The box score from Daytona tells the story. There were 20 Fords, 14 Chevy Monte Carlos and nine Pontiacs in the "Daytona 500" field. Ford swept the first five spots at the finish for the first time since the 1963 "Daytona 500." Of the nine lead changes among seven drivers those in Fords were in front for 158 laps of 200 laps.
Other than Mike Skinner's pass on Ricky Rudd for the lead on lap two, the
only Chevy guy who looked to me like he might threaten during the race was
Dale Earnhardt. Did you have as much trouble figuring out who was in
Earnhardt's car when CBS did those topside shots of the cars coming through
the Daytona tri-oval as I did? I don't know how many times I wondered
who was driving that red-orange car with the thing (I guess it was a cartoon
character of some kind) on the hood.
Dale Earnhardt didn't lead but he was running fourth with 30 laps to go. At the finish, Dale was seven positions behind his son and employee Dale Earnhardt Jr., in 21st place. Father criticized son after the race in the media. "Big E" said all "Little E" wanted to do was pass and he didn't get in line and help anyone let alone his dad and boss. Old man Earnhardt was in a cantankerous mood in Daytona wasn't he? Judging by the way he reacted in a pre-race interview on CBS with his son, Earnhardt doesn't like being called "Dale Earnhardt Sr." either. He still must have some aches and pains from the off-season surgery to repair a herniated disc or whatever it was that was ailing him.
Both Earnhardt and Jeff Gordon were in strange colored cars. We didn't get many looks at Jeff's silver number 24 though. Gordon didn't get much higher than 12th or 13th before smoke began coming out of the Dupont car and it was taken behind the wall for repairs shortly after lap 30. Do you begin to get the sense that the 2000 season might prove to be one of those character-building years for Jeff Gordon?
Michael Waltrip took a wild ride, a hard upside down tumble, on Saturday in the Busch Grand National race and had to be hurting on Sunday. Despite that, Waltrip was running good for most of the "Daytona 500" in the Nations Rent Chevrolet. Waltrip was in fourth place behind Dale Jarrett, Bill Elliott and Rusty Wallace at the ten-lap mark. He remained in fourth through lap 30, fell out of the top ten for a while, but moved back into that group again by lap 60. On lap 100 Waltrip was running fourth again behind Mark Martin, Jarrett and Rusty Wallace. Then Michael dropped back and was running in a pack of cars about one second behind the lead pack when Jimmy Spencer bumped Waltrip's car 7 in the tri-oval on lap 191. That set off a chain reaction, which resulted in Waltrip being nailed by Elliott Sadler who had nowhere else to go.
If the day wasn't very good for the Chevrolet drivers, things didn't go a lot better for the teams running the Pontiac Grand Prix either.
One of my two guys Tony Stewart was running a good race until he hit a tire
on pit road roughly one third of the way through the 500 miles. Tony ran
as high as fourth and he had the orange and white Home Depot Pontiac car
20 in the top ten until the final laps of the race. Stewart ended up
17th. Without the
collision with the loose tire in the pits and an injury to one of his crewmen
during another stop, Tony could've been with the leaders at the finish if
his early race performance was any indication.
Ward Burton was another Pontiac guy who was looking good at Daytona. Burton ran in the top ten for most of the race. Ward is a good driver I think. He usually takes a back seat to younger brother Jeff Burton but one of these days I think he's going to break out and the wins will start coming on a regular basis. I may be wrong, but I believe Ward's only Winston Cup win came at Rockingham in October 1995.
At various times in the event Mike Skinner, Dale Earnhardt, Michael Waltrip, Tony Stewart and Ward Burton tried to make a race of it for General Motors. The 42nd "Daytona 500" was a day for Ford Motor Company to shine however. Good days in the "Daytona 500" don't come that often for the "blue oval" boys from Dearborn. The only other Ford wins in the "Daytona 500" in the past ten years came in 1992 with Davey Allison and 1996 with Dale Jarrett. This time it wasn't even close and I'm taking Johnny Benson's two-tire pit stop gamble that came within four laps of giving the "Daytona 500" a surprise winner into consideration when I make that assertion.
I didn't seriously consider that Benson was going to win in that plain white Pontiac car 10. I'm not even sure which team he was driving for although I think it's the team that Darrell Waltrip used to own. That's not to say that Johnny Benson isn't a good racer either. Benson is another American Speed Association (ASA) graduate like Mark Martin, Alan Kulwicki and Dick Trickle before him. He came to NASCAR and won the Busch Grand National title a few years ago. He replaced Michael Waltrip in what was then the 30 Pennzoil Pontiac for Bahari Racing and then moved on to Jack Roush's team in a car sponsored by Cheerios. When the Cheerios money went away, Roush folded the team and Benson was out of a ride. Benson was the first "Daytona 500" qualifier on Saturday February 12. The night before the race his team acquired full season sponsorship from the Internet search engine Lycos. If he had been able to hold the lead for another four laps his name would've gone into the history books as a "Daytona 500" winner on the same list as most of the all time NASCAR greats. Realistically that would've seemed inappropriate to me just as the wins by Tiny Lund, Pete Hamilton and Derrike Cope seemed inappropriate.
Where did second place finisher Jeff Burton come from? He was riding around in the second five positions for much of the race and I wasn't paying much attention to him. It might've been that I'm used to the black, pink and silver color scheme that used to be on Burton's number 99 Exide car, rather than the new white and blue colors. It seemed like Burton's big break came when he followed Dale Jarrett on the inside past Benson. Burton's good fortune proved to be Roush teammate Mark Martin's undoing.
I've never been a big Mark Martin fan, although I recognize him as a tough, determined competitor who is one of the best drivers in racing. Martin gets on my nerves, with his grouchy demeanor and high-pitched, "whiney" voice. Mark hasn't had a lot of impressive runs at Daytona but I thought he looked good this time. Next to race winner Jarrett, Martin had the best run last Sunday in my opinion.
When a tire on Martin's Valvoline car 6 fell apart a little past one-third distance, it forced Mark to pit out of sequence with the other leaders and return to the race one lap down. However Martin caught up again when the others pitted and by lap 100, he was leading the race.
Martin stayed in front until he and nearly everyone else made late race stops. This was one of the key moments of the race. Martin, Jarrett, Rusty Wallace, Jeff Burton and most of the other cars took four tires, while a group of five cars led by Benson and Bill Elliott only changed two tires. This enabled Benson and Elliott to lead everyone out of the pits.
As they completed 190 laps, Martin made repeated attempts to pass Benson for the lead but he was unsuccessful as Johnny, Mark, Jarrett, Jeff Burton, Elliott and Rusty Wallace ran in a tight lead draft.
Martin and Jarrett made a deal via their spotters to move to the front together
but Jarrett moved out of Martin's draft and went low, taking Jeff Burton,
Elliott and Wallace with him, which allowed Martin to be left behind on the
outside. Then the Michael Waltrip, Jimmy Spencer crash happened in the tri-oval
on lap 191. Jarrett chased after Benson but was unable to catch the 10
car at the line.
NASCAR cleaned up the Waltrip - Spencer crash and the race restarted on lap 197. This time Jarrett was ready and he went low on Benson through the banking and got the lead. Poor Benson was left "hung out to dry" on the outside as they say on TV and he fell back to 12th.
The next time by, someone (Derrike Cope I think) pushed into the wall and the yellow flag came out again. Jarrett and his pursuers, Burton, Elliott and Wallace raced back to the line to receive both the caution and white flags and that was it.
When a racer is "riding a wave" like Dale Jarrett is currently, coming off the 1999 Winston Cup title, it seems he can do no wrong. During Saturday's "happy hour" practice, car 88 was involved in a high-speed game of tag with Jeff Gordon and Bill Elliott. The damage was bad enough that crew chief Todd Parrott considered withdrawing the car in favor of a backup, which would've placed Jarrett at the rear of the Daytona grid. Instead the decision was made to call in extra help from the Robert Yates shop in North Carolina. The team worked every available moment in the Daytona garages to repair car 88.
Jarrett let the race sort out before going for the lead on lap five. After the race, he said he knew within the first four laps that his car hadn't lost anything from the previous day's mishap. Jarrett was in control until pitting near the halfway point of the race, but he was always close to the front. As a friend of mine wrote, "the best man won." With the exception of losing to Elliott in the first 125-mile qualifier Daytona Speedweeks belonged to Dale Jarrett and the 88 Quality Care/Ford Credit Taurus. Dale won the pole and the "Bud Shootout" the previous weekend.
I remember watching when Dale Jarrett barely beat Davey Allison to the line at Michigan in June 1991 for his first Winston Cup victory. Jarrett was driving a Ford Thunderbird car 21 for the Wood Brothers. I was happy for him at the time, as he had been hanging around the fringes of winning prior to that.
2 1/2 years later, Jarrett held off Dale Earnhardt on the final lap of the 1993 "Daytona 500." The image is vivid of father Ned Jarrett excitedly shouting the words "Dale Jarrett is goin' to win the Daytona 500" over CBS, as his son's bright green Joe Gibbs Interstate Batteries number 18 Chevy Lumina beat Earnhardt's black number 3 to the finish line.
I recall when Jarrett finally took a win at Pocono as the substitute for injured Ernie Irvan in the Robert Yates Texaco number 28 after a lackluster start to the 1995 season. After that, Jarrett picked up the pace enough to convince Yates to add a second car for his 1996 Winston Cup program. The Quality Care 88 team, of Dale Jarrett and Todd Parrott, was born and their first race was the 1996 "Daytona 500." The Jarrett - Parrott pairing yielded immediate results and won Daytona, beating Dale Earnhardt again. In August of that same year Jarrett and Yates teammate Ernie Irvan put on a classic battle for victory in perhaps the only exciting contest in the six-year history of the "Brickyard 400." Jarrett repeated his 1996 "Brickyard 400" win last August at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. That race was about as exciting as last Sunday's race at Daytona.
Going by his performance this month at Daytona, it's not difficult to see Jarrett repeating his Winston Cup championship. This looks to be his time. He seems like a nice family guy and he is from good stock as Ned Jarrett comes across as being a fine man. I remember getting an autograph from Ned Jarrett at the Indiana State Fairgrounds in September 1964. I think it was 1964. Jarrett was at the Fairgrounds to race in the USAC stock car "Century 100" that annually closed the Indiana State Fair years ago. Jarrett was racing a deep blue metallic Ford Galaxy number 11.
The other drivers most mentioned with Dale Jarrett as pre-race favorites
to win Daytona were his new Yates teammate Ricky Rudd, Rusty Wallace and
Bill Elliott. Rudd led at the start of the race but faded early and ended
up 16th at the finish. Wallace ran well but didn't quite seem
to have enough to go to the front and settled for a fourth place finish.
I was excited about Elliott's prospects going into the race and Bill ran
well in the 94 McDonald's car. He ran at the front before falling back with
an overheating engine, but climbed back to the front to follow Jarrett and
Jeff Burton to the finish line behind the NASCAR pace car. I hope Daytona
starts an upward movement for Bill Elliott.
This was the final CBS telecast of the "Daytona 500." Fox and NBC begin alternating Daytona coverage next season as the new NASCAR TV contract goes into effect. It was nostalgic to hear Ken Squier whom I believed coined the phrase, "the Great American Race," close out the CBS telecast. Here's a prediction. Ken Squier, Mike Joy, Buddy Baker and Ned Jarrett will all be part of the Fox broadcast team next February at Daytona.
Perhaps the decided edge the Ford Tauruses had going into the 42nd "Daytona 500" and the expected lack of competition kept people away from their televisions last Sunday. It was reported that the TV ratings for this year's CBS telecast were the lowest since 1993 at 8.4. The ratings for the 1999 "Daytona 500" were 9.6.
Despite the lower TV ratings this year, I kept thinking how much the "Daytona
500" has grown over the years as I saw the crowd of 190,000 at Daytona
International Speedway watching the race under sunny blue skies. It's always
been a huge event, for me the closest thing to the "Indianapolis 500" in
terms of importance, prestige and magic. This year it got even closer. In
1999, International Speedway Corporation dug deep in its pockets to increase
the "Daytona 500" purse to $8,110,228. Race winner Jeff Gordon won a total
$2,194.246, although $1 million of that came from the Winston "No Bull" program
since Gordon was one of the five eligible drivers. Last May the Indianapolis
Motor Speedway paid $9,047,150 to the 33 drivers in the "Indianapolis 500."
Winner Kenny Brack earned $1,465,190.
I don't know if it got the attention of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway
when the total purse for this year's "Daytona 500" was announced at $9,367,616,
but it certainly got mine. Jarrett received an all time record prize of
$2,277,975, although $1 million of that also came from the Winston "No Bull"
program. Does anyone want to bet the purse for the "Indianapolis 500"
in May will surpass $10 million?