Opportunities From the Daytona 500
by Michael Daly-Staff Writer
02/20/2008

The 50th Daytona 500 managed to do something unusual for modern NASCAR - it stayed within the form chart of the last five years yet at the same time offered something different, and presented opportunities for teams moving forward in 2008. The 500 cracked 40 official lead changes for only the second time since 1983 and thus proved to be a memorable race. In this competitive malestrom it opened a door for some teams as the season kicks off. With the finish of the 500, a look at what did and didn't happen and where teams may go from here -

DODGE MOTORSPORTS -
PENSKE RACING - By far the biggest opportunity was presented to Roger Penske's team, as Roger's beleagured #12 ace Ryan Newman shook off four dismal seasons and exploded back to the front page. After icing down eight wins in 2003, Newman spent the next four years lacking answers for NASCAR's often-absurd changes in downforce and tires, this while Rusty Wallace ran out his last two years behind the wheel and then Kurt Busch came on board and notched three wins, including runaways last summer at Pocono and Michigan.

The Penske teams appeared to vastly improve their inter-team cooperation, with their crew chiefs huddling frequently to exchange notes and ideas. It obviously showed up as Newman's comeback win had a liberating quality for the organization. Newman, Kurt Busch, and new teammate Sam Hornish all acquitted themselves at Daytona and need to ride that momentum forward and keep attacking the tracks as they often haven't the last few years.

GILLETT-EVERNHAM RACING - The quietest team of Speedweeks put both of its cars into the top seven and put their newest satellite car into eighth, and this after Elliott Sadler spent a lot of time whacking the SAFER barrier. Now they did something like this last year as well and it didn't translate into any momentum; they can't let that momentum slip away again.

GANASSI-SABCO RACING - We've gopt potential problems here as Reed Sorenson was fast all week and stormed to the front whenever he had to, while his higher-profile teammates never had answers. Juan Montoya didn't win any new friends after dumping Clint Bowyer, while Ashley Judd's hats made more noise than Dario Franchitti all week - you knew something wasn't going to work here when Franchitti made no noise in the ARCA race.

PETTY ENTERPRISES - How's this for strange? Petty Enterprises posted its best Daytona effort since 1999, and yet it illustrated all the more how far behind they still are. Bobby Labonte finished 11th, yet the Petty team remains dead last in the Dodge class; for all of Labonte and Robbie Loomis' efforts the #43 never got higher than ninth and like almost everyone else wasn't sucking up in the draft like they needed to; Labonte's Talladega run last October was far better than here despite Daytona's decent finsih.

Labonte of course got no help from teammate Kyle Petty, conspicuously absent from the top-30 all day with yet another disgraceful non-effort lacking any kind of urgency or fire. Labonte and the Petty organization deserve better than that; they deserve a teammate who will actually try to win the race.

TOYOTA MOTORSPORTS - Yes, they're for real. Yes, they showed they're for real with wins on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday and superior strength on Sunday. But those who feared Toyota's effort might be a one-team show had reason for such concern. While the Joe Gibbs team stormed to the front, the other Toyotas didn't make much noise other than 12th for Brian Vickers. Bill Davis Racing made a decent go of it until Dave Blaney crashed; of course their vaunted rookie Jacques Villeneuve wore out his welcome and got fired after the 150s, a driver change not worth shedding a tear over. Michael Waltrip was mediocre at best, and that's pretty much the most one can expect here.

JOE GIBBS RACING - For one race at least the triad some felt would implode instead hooked together and rumbled. Kyle Busch was everything people expected - he raced hard and put the car where he wanted. Tony Stewart, meanwhile, got skunked at the 500 for the tenth time - it is amazing the question "Can Tony Stewart win the 500?" has not been a media obsession the way "Can Dale Earnhardt win the 500?" used to be.

HENDRICK MOTORSPORTS - Now we saw something like this in the 2007 500 and the subsequent season was as different as one could ever see, but for the second 500 in a row Hendrick Motorsports from Thursday onward changed from the sport's unstoppable force into just another four-car team with no answers. Jeff Gordon's suspension failure - which he noted showed up in preseason testing, and which looked suspiciously like an inevitable by-product of performance flaws inherent in the COT - was followed by Jimmie Johnson's spin and Casey Mears' crash, and capped off a day in which no one in the team could do anything. Dale Junior's ninth-place finish was as far from the expected Speedweeks sweep as one could get, and given that Junior's best tracks remain the plate tracks, one has to wonder about the season forward for him.

DEI - If you're questioning Teresa Earnhardt's commitment to winning and/or basic competence as a team owner, you got a lot of ammo from DEI's mediocre Speedweeks. No one from the DEI shops distinguished themselves all week. Paul Menard and Regan Smith looked clueless all week - par for the course with regard to Menard - while Mark Martin and Martin Truex could never get out of the pack. After the mediocrity of the previous three seasons, this is the kind of start suggesting more of the same.

RCR ENTERPRISES - Actually this turned out to be a typical RCR Daytona - run strong then lose the 500 at the end. Kevin Harvick was never much of a threat, which made the victory bid by teammate Jeff Burton all the more surprising - but one could see the ending coming because of all those late yellows, with no realistic prospect of Burton holding off the pack behind him. Clint Bowyer's chances actually looked better when he stormed into the lead, but a Montoya swerve ended that wildcard bid. Despite their Daytona effort, RCR is a team in need of momentum going forward as they won the 500 last year and then largely bogged down.

FORD RACING - A mixed bag indiciative of a mediocre season to come. Despite strong efforts by Greg Biffle and Matt Kenseth and a decent effort by Carl Edwards, Roush never had the muscle to pull off a Daytona upset, and the conspicuous absense of Jamie McMurray plus the wreck of David Ragan says something about lack of depth here. The only other Ford team at Daytona, the Roush-Yates effort, went nowhere from Jump Street as Travis Kvapil and David Gilliland lived up to their talent - hence their dismal finishes.

EVERYONE ELSE - Gene Haas' Chevrolets as usual made no noise, yet Jeremy Mayfield's 23rd-place finish was surprisingly good. Teammate Scott Riggs meanwhile continues to cut a path toward oblivion despite finishing 21st. J.J. Yeley had no fire with Joe Gibbs' #18; to expect any better from his satellite #96 is asking too much. Joe Nemechek and Kenny Wallace expedned 110% just to make the 500 and thus had nothing left once they were in it, while John Andretti did better than expected to make the 500; he too had nothing left once he made it in.

Thus did Speedweeks 2008 come to an end and the 2008 season get off to a surprisingly flying start.

Questions? Comments? Contact Michael Daly at stp43fan@hotmail.com

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