Not surprisingly, most of the focus was up front in Thursday night’s 150-milers that set the grid for Sunday afternoon’s Daytona 500 at Daytona International Speedway. Also, not surprisingly, there was way more gut-wrenching drama lurking deep in the fields for the 21 drivers in each of the 60-lap races. The stakes were immeasurably higher for low-budget teams at the back of the grids than for those blue bloods at the front.
That’s because 18 of the 21 starters in each race knew that regardless of what happened, they’ll race again on Sunday (except for pole-winner Chase Elliott and second-fastest Earnhardt Jr., they just didn’t know where they’ll start). Those 36 drivers, the fortunate few on teams holding NASCAR charters, a franchise-like entre into every Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series race have guaranteed entry. That left only four spots remaining on the 40 car 500 grid and six drivers scrapping for them. The pressure then on the non-Charter teams was enormous.
The picture cleared some early, with Brendan Gaughan, Corey LaJoie and Reed Sorensen in the first race. LaJoie and Gaughan finished 18th and 19th, somewhat better than Sorenson’s wreck-related 21st. By racing his way into the 500 with his finish position, Gaughan didn’t need the safety net of being the fastest of the six “Open” drivers.
LaJoie, son of former Xfinity Series champion Randy LaJoie and grandson of a noted New England short-track star, could barely contain his emotions at making his first Daytona 500. “This is cool as hell,” he said afterward. “This is amazing. Every kid in a race car dreams of racing in a Daytona 500 and I get to do that Sunday. And it’s not even just my family; it’s every person who helped me get to this moment, too. It’s been a hard road and I’ve still got a long way to go but it starts Sunday.
“You come here idolizing Jimmie Johnson and Dale Earnhardt Jr. and all of these guys. I’m fans of all of these guys and I get to race all of them on Sunday. I’m excited to get up there and dice it up. The team really wanted me to protect the car because the backup car on a smaller team isn’t as good as the primary. We had to protect that thing at the end. I felt like we could’ve gotten up there and maybe could’ve gotten a couple more spots; but regardless, when it all shakes out on Sunday we’ll see where we land.”
Contact from LaJoie sent Sorenson against an inside wall and out after 48 of 60 laps. “I really feel bad about Reed,” LaJoie said. “I just tried to fill a hole. It was getting down to it and I probably had the position on him. But I’d probably wreck my mom if she was in that spot when I was trying to get into the Daytona 500.”
With a mostly ho-hum first race, it was left to Canadian driver D.J. Kennington and Elliott Sadler to spice up the night in the second 150. After crunching the numbers and studying the results from the first race, Kennington’s team told him he had to beat Sadler to advance to the 500. (Timmy Hill, the third “Open” driver in their race, went out early with engine trouble).
Sadler and Kennington were dead-even approaching the checkered before Kennington eased by at the line. “They said it was five feet,” he said later. “It might have been five inches. Whatever, it was enough to get me in the Daytona 500. I knew I wasn’t in the 500 in Turn 4 on the last lap and I was in the 500 at the start-finish line. We were in a pile of cars and I was determined not to lift. I knew that if I did, I wouldn’t make the 500. I wasn’t going to wreck anybody, but I wasn’t going to lift, either. Going down the backstretch (on the last lap) I knew what I had to do. I just know how I was going to do it.
“This is a huge moment for me and everybody who’s helped me get here. I don’t even know how to explain it. I feel like I won the Daytona 500. I’m an old man now. Years and years of racing and trying and doing all things is nothing but good for my career. This is huge for Canada and it’s huge for my team and my friends and family. It’s an unbelievable feeling. The hardest part is done. Now we get to have some fun.”
Despite losing a spot in the final few hundred yards, the night didn’t turn out so badly for Sadler. Because he was second-fastest among the six “Open” drivers, he also advanced to the Daytona 500. Alas, the same can’t be said of Hill and Sorenson… and it’s a long, long time until next year.
Unemployed after three years as an Army officer and Vietnam vet, Al Pearce shamelessly lied his way onto a small newspaper’s sports staff in Virginia in 1969. He inherited motorsports, a strange and unfamiliar beat which quickly became an obsession.
In 53 years – 48 ongoing with Autoweek – there have been thousands of NASCAR, NHRA, IMSA, and APBA assignments on weekend tracks and major venues like Daytona Beach, Indianapolis, LeMans, and Watkins Glen. The job – and accompanying benefits – has taken him to all 50 states and more than a dozen countries.
He’s been fortunate enough to attract interest from several publishers, thus his 13 motorsports-related books. He can change a tire on his Hyundai, but that’s about it.
