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Busch's Bid Ends With Wreck

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By TONY FABRIZIO afabrizio@tampatrib.com

The Tampa Tribune

Published: February 16, 2009

DAYTONA BEACH - Kyle Busch had the car to win Sunday's Daytona 500. He did not have the luck that's also needed in a restrictor-plate race.

After leading 88 of the first 123 laps, he found himself in the wrong place on a restart when Dale Earnhardt Jr. turned Brian Vickers into traffic. Earnhardt and Vickers were a lap down and battling the for the free pass awarded with each caution flag.

Busch was among 10 drivers involved in the crash, and his day was done.

"One guy that had problems all day on pit road made his problems our problems, and then our problems became a big problem," a sarcastic Busch said, referring to Earnhardt being frustrated over two pit road errors, the second of which resulted in a one-lap penalty.

"It was just unfortunate with that, and it was uncalled for to have two lapped cars racing each other and bumping each other like that. You'll have that, I guess, in big-time auto racing."

Busch has led 174 of the past 352 laps run in the Daytona 500, and he has finishes of fourth and 41st to show for it. Ironically, his brother Kurt, who didn't lead a lap Sunday, has finished better than Kyle in the past two 500s. Kyle Busch won two of the four restrictor-plate races last year: in the spring at Talladega and the summer at Daytona.

SCHOOL OF HARD KNOCKS

Rookie Joey Logano, at 18 the youngest driver to race in the Daytona 500, ended a roller coaster Speedweeks with a hard crash.

Tony Stewart's ultra-hyped replacement crashed early in the Budweiser Shootout and tagged the wall in practice, but came back to finish fourth in one of Thursday's 150-mile qualifiers.

On Lap 81 Sunday, he checked up in Turn 4 to avoid hitting Scott Speed and got tagged by Greg Biffle. Logano's No. 20 Toyota shot across the run-off pavement and hit the infield SAFER Barrier head-on.

"It's partially my fault for not getting around Speed after seeing he was loose a few laps before," Logano said.

RACING, ATHLETES & GLITZ

Among the celebrities NASCAR president Mike Helton introduced during the drivers meeting were actors Tom Cruise and Gene Hackman, Florida quarterback Tim Tebow, South Carolina coach Steve Spurrier, Bucs receiver Joey Galloway, Miami Dolphins coach Tony Sparano and New York Jets coach Rex Ryan.

Tebow, who led the Gators to their second national championship in three seasons last month, received a particularly enthusiastic ovation from the drivers, crew chiefs, team owners, corporate CEOs and military officers attending.

Cruise was provided one of the cars from his 1990 racing movie "Days of Thunder" by team owner Rick Hendrick to take around the track a few times.

Gov. Charlie Crist was the grand marshal, and three-time Daytona 500 winner Bobby Allison waved the opening green flag.

NEEDED A RETRACTABLE ROOF

Mark Martin finished a quiet 16th after starting on the outside pole in his first points race driving Hendrick Motorsports' No. 5 Chevy. But the 50-year-old veteran thinks the race could have turned out differently if it had gone the distance.

"We got out of sequence on pitting, but if the thing went a little longer we were heading toward the front with our buddy, Jeff Gordon," he said.

Matt Kenseth was declared the winner after 152 of the scheduled 200 laps.

ACCOUNTED FOR

There was no driver named Petty in the Daytona 500 for the first time in more than four decades, but the Petty name made a splash anyway.

Newly created Richard Petty Motorsports - a team owned primarily by George Gillett and formed through a merger of Gillett-Evernham Motorsports and Petty Enterprises - had three drivers finish in the top nine.

Surprisingly, A.J. Allmendinger was third, Elliott Sadler fifth and Reed Sorenson, using the famed No. 43, was ninth.

The last time a Petty driver wasn't in the field was 1965, when Richard Petty went drag racing in protest of NASCAR banning Dodge's hemi engine.

HOT LAPS

Country music superstar Keith Urban played a couple of acoustic songs in the media center before his prerace concert. He got a pretty good laugh when he named Disney Pixar's "Cars" as his favorite racing movie. ... Although the poor economy took a toll on Speedweeks overall, the grandstands were sold out for the Daytona 500. Only infield admissions were sold Sunday.

Tony Fabrizio

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