DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. (AP) The good news for NASCAR is that all signs prove Dale Earnhardt Jr. has a legitimate shot to win a Daytona 500.
A feat for NASCAR’s many renouned driver, in his lapse to racing after a concussion sidelined him a second half of final season, would be a vast boost for a sagging series. Earnhardt’s star energy has been one of a splendid spots of Speedweeks and his strength on a lane has been apparent any time he’s behind a circle of his Chevrolet.
Earnhardt was partial of a Hendrick Motorsports subordinate brush for Sunday’s season-opening race. Chase Elliott won a pole, and Earnhardt will line adult subsequent to him on a starting grid. Elliott combined a win in a subordinate race, and Earnhardt led 53 of 60 laps in a second subordinate competition before he was upheld during a finish .
So a Hendrick cars have speed, a drivers aren’t humble from a Toyota teamwork that dominated final year’s race, and they are prepared to go bumper-to-bumper with a Team Penske fleet.
It means Sunday could be a clever opening day for NASCAR, quite if Earnhardt can lift off his third feat in ”The Great American Race.” He’s not prepared to call himself a favorite, and thinks he’ll have his hands full with a Joe Gibbs Racing organisation and Penske drivers Joey Logano and Brad Keselowski.
”Watching a final several image races, we consider a Gibbs guys have a marketplace cornered on a favorite,” he said. ”The Penske guys are unequivocally strong. So we consider it’s their competition to lose. The Hendrick cars are going to be adult there perplexing to brew it up.”
NASCAR needs Sunday to go off though a hitch.
The array is underneath complicated inspection since of shifting assemblage and radio ratings, and a pretension unite understanding with Monster Energy came in during a fragment of what NASCAR was looking for when it began selling a fixing rights roughly dual years ago.
NASCAR distinguished a understanding with Monster in a Las Vegas announcement, and has hitched a automobile to a wish that Monster can attract a younger demographic and lift a fad turn during all a events. But there was small signage around a lane during Speedweeks, and one of a few indications Monster is a new unite were a scantily-clad women around for some of a resplendence and circumstance. There’s been no radio graduation and NASCAR was even a theme of a vicious hearing in a Wall Street Journal.
NASCAR has countered with a JGR proclamation that fortifying competition leader Denny Hamlin and FedEx have sealed long-term extensions , while Team Penske sealed in Logano and Shell-Pennzoil by 2023.
”People are articulate about a health of a sport, and this is a watershed moment,” Roger Penske pronounced of an prolongation that took scarcely a year to finish with Shell.
Both FedEx and Shell-Pennzoil are vital sponsors who spend something tighten to $20 million a year to code a competition cars and marketplace to a NASCAR audience.
”This is a unequivocally certain story in a sport, to see a joining of a unequivocally vast association like Shell and Pennzoil are and for them to be means to pointer adult with this organisation unequivocally creates a matter for not usually where Team Penske is, though for where NASCAR is as a sport,” Logano said.
Problem is, NASCAR doesn’t nonetheless know accurately where it is.
NASCAR will launch a new graduation debate on Sunday called ”Ready. Set. Race.” and a crash-filled 30-second TV ad was suggested Saturday to foster a 500 .
In an bid to supplement fad to a racing – something both a radio partners and Monster wanted – all events will be run in segments this year. It means a Daytona 500 won’t accurately be a 500-mile competition of attrition, though will instead be cut into 3 parts. There are points on a line for any segment, giving drivers inducement to competition tough for a whole race, and one final prolonged pull to a mottled flag.
It’s a unsure pierce for NASCAR, though one embraced publicly by drivers. Some fans, quite longtime watchers, are frightened during a gimmicks NASCAR is using, though a rising stand of immature drivers are fervent to give it a try.
”I consider we have a organisation of guys entrance along that are going to put their signature on this sport,” pronounced organisation owners Chip Ganassi. ”The sport’s left by some changes. We’re looking during a new format. Some of us comparison guys, when they speak about changing a format, we demeanour during any other, ask questions. These immature drivers, they go, `OK.’ It’s kind of no large understanding to those guys.
”I consider that says a lot about how they proceed it, how they demeanour brazen to it. So we consider it’s flattering splendid when we have an opinion like that.”
Indeed, a faces are fast changing in NASCAR as a stars are aging out of their rides.
Jeff Gordon is now a radio researcher and will expostulate a gait automobile on Sunday . Tony Stewart late during a finish of final season. Carl Edwards motionless in late Dec he didn’t wish to competition this year after entrance 10 laps brief of winning a championship. Greg Biffle has committed to a radio job.
With all those open seats, a array is starting to change and there’s some-more courtesy for drivers like Elliott, Gordon’s deputy a year ago, and Daniel Suarez, a Mexican motorist who incited his Xfinity Series championship into a graduation to a Cup array when Edwards retired.
JGR growth motorist Erik Jones is a rookie this year and will organisation with Martin Truex Jr. during Furniture Row Racing as de facto Gibbs drivers.
Austin Dillon done a playoffs final year, and his younger brother, Ty, has a full-time Cup float this season. Kyle Larson also done a playoffs, and Ryan Blaney had a prolific rookie deteriorate pushing as a Penske growth driver.
The starting grid Sunday will demeanour a lot younger, though a automobile owners who compensate for a talent don’t seem to mind.
”I adore to watch a immature guys. we don’t know either it creates me feel immature again, we don’t know what it is,” pronounced Rick Hendrick. ”It’s only fun to watch those guys mature, grow, come adult by a ranks. I’ve never seen a turn of talent that we have today. we consider these guys adjust so most faster. we consider it’s due to video games, simulators, all that.
”The turn of a immature guys that we see entrance along that have a talent that they have, it’s super exciting.”
—
More AP automobile racing: www.racing.ap.org