CUP: Despite valiant efforts to repair a bent splitter, McMurray finishes last in The Clash

PHOTO: @MRNRadio

Jamie McMurray finished last in Sunday’s Advance Auto Parts Clash at the Daytona International Speedway when his #1 Cessna Chevrolet fell out with crash damage after 43 of 75 laps.

Despite a winless streak stretching back to 2013, McMurray closed out his 2017 season with a third-straight Playoff appearance, making it to the second round before a crash at Talladega knocked him out of the running. The Playoff appearance secured him a spot in this, his twelfth Clash, as he continues to search for his first pole since 2014. Though he won the Daytona 500 in 2010, McMurray had never won The Clash, coming as close as second in 2009 and 2011. He’d also led laps in four of the previous five, though crashed in two of those.

McMurray’s new Camaro from the Chip Ganassi Racing stables ran 13th in Saturday’s lone practice session, and drew sixteenth – next-to-last – for the main event. The field would consist of seventeen cars for the second-straight year, tied for the fewest in the race since 2000. Three eligible drivers did not enter: the retired Dale Earnhardt, Jr., Matt Kenseth, who was unable to find another top ride after ending his tenure at Joe Gibbs Racing, and Danica Patrick, whose deal to drive for Premium Motorsports came too late to prepare for the event. As of this writing, all three have not been classified in the official running order in the same way as other eligible, but missing drivers, have.

Starting last was Brad Keselowski, who would ultimately drive his #2 Miller Lite Ford to victory. At the start, Keselowski trailed into the first corner, following his new teammate Ryan Blaney in the #12 Menards Ford. He passed Blaney by the end of the first lap, and Blaney then moved Kyle Busch to last by the backstretch.

On Lap 3, Kasey Kahne took the last spot. Making his first start for Leavine Family Racing in the #95 Procore Chevrolet, Kahne was struggling with the team’s twitter reported as a “minor malfunction with the right side window board.” The issue so distracted Kahne that he couldn’t report on the car’s handling, and he began to lose touch with the lead pack. By Lap 6, he was a half-second behind the next car. Two laps later, he was three seconds out. Then seventeen back on Lap 14. The crew reassured Kahne he would be able to stay on the lead lap until the first stage ended on Lap 25. He did – though he was now thirty-nine seconds back of the leader – and a crewman climbed through the driver’s window to fix the issue. Pit stops by most of the leaders before the caution dropped Martin Truex, Jr. to last, but Kahne re-took the spot after his stop.

When the race restarted on Lap 30, Kahne was able to keep up with the pack, and dropped Ryan Newman to last down the backstretch. For the next four laps, Newman would trade the spot with Ricky Stenhouse, Jr. as both struggled to keep up. It was during this battle on Lap 34 that the caution flew once more, bringing McMurray into the mix.

At the time, McMurray was in a battle with Kurt Busch near the front of the field. When Busch made a move to McMurray’s inside, Busch made contact with McMurray’s left-rear, sending the #1 Chevrolet into a spin. The car avoided the rest of the field, but then cut right and nosed into the outside wall with the right-front corner, then drove through the grass on his way to pit road. McMurray reported something dragging beneath his car, and the crew changed tires to get him out quickly. They sent him out for a lap, during which time McMurray drove his car on and off the banking in an effort to fix his twisted splitter. Then the crew put a block under the front valence and dropped the jack, trying to do the same.

The crew’s efforts kept McMurray in the race, but now one lap down when it restarted. But McMurray still wasn’t happy with the car, at one point saying “That’s about all I got.” On Lap 44, around the time Ricky Stenhouse, Jr. was issued a drive-through penalty for going below the yellow line entering Turn 3, McMurray was told by his crew to take it to the garage, making him the race’s first retiree. Stenhouse’s penalty cost him a lap of his own, leaving him next-to-last. The rest of the Bottom Five – including Kahne, who had somewhat recovered from his slow start – was filled by a grinding last-lap accident entering the third turn.

LASTCAR STATISTICS
*This marked the first last-place finish for both McMurray and car #1 in the Clash.
*McMurray’s 43 laps complete are the most by a last-place finisher of the Clash.

THE BOTTOM FIVE
17) #1-Jamie McMurray / 43 laps / crash
16) #17-Ricky Stenhouse, Jr. / 73 laps / running
15) #95-Kasey Kahne / 74 laps / running
14) #78-Martin Truex, Jr. / 74 laps / running
13) #9-Chase Elliott / 74 laps / running

PREVIEW: As offseason dust settles, 2018 entry lists filled with several team and driver changes

PHOTO: @JEarnhardt1

I’m debuting a new look for Entry List Storylines in 2018. The objective remains the same – to track the entry list changes from one week to the next, and to preview new names and teams joining the series. For this week’s installment, we’ll focus on the changes made over the offseason in the Cup, XFINITY, and Truck lineup. Efforts will be made to update these articles as more news breaks, so it can be referred-to up to each race.

Sunday, February 11, 2018
CUP Exhibition Race
The Clash at Daytona
2017 Last-Place Finisher: Kurt Busch

ENTRY LIST (17 DRIVERS)
#1-Jamie McMurray, #2-Brad Keselowski, #3-Austin Dillon, #4-Kevin Harvick, #9-Chase Elliott, #11-Denny Hamlin, #12-Ryan Blaney, #17-Ricky Stenhouse, Jr., #18-Kyle Busch, #20-Erik Jones, #22-Joey Logano, #31-Ryan Newman, #41-Kurt Busch, #42-Kyle Larson, #48-Jimmie Johnson, #78-Martin Truex, Jr., #95-Kasey Kahne

ELIGIBLE, BUT NOT ENTERED
Dale Earnhardt, Jr. (Two poles in 2017, Alex Bowman now drives #88, not entered either)
Matt Kenseth (Two poles in 2017, Erik Jones now drives #20, entered instead)
Danica Patrick (No poles in 2017, 2013 Daytona 500 polesitter, running Daytona 500 only)

Thursday, February 15, 2018
CUP Exhibition Races
Can-Am Duels at Daytona
2017 Last-Place Finishers: Chris Buescher (Race 1), A.J. Allmendinger (Race 2)

Last year, JTG-Daugherty Racing teammates Chris Buescher and A.J. Allmendinger were classified last in their races due to post-race disqualifications. They moved up from last both Reed Sorenson and Timmy Hill, two Open team drivers who missed the 500 field.

Friday, February 16, 2018
TRUCKS Race 1 of 23
NextEra Energy Resources 250 at Daytona
2017 Last-Place Finisher: Tommy Joe Martins

#2, #25-GMS Racing
DRIVER & NUMBER CHANGES
GMS Racing has a new lineup for 2018. With Kaz Grala moving to XFINITY, the former #33 team is now #2, bringing on Cody Coughlin and sponsorship from JEGS. Joining him is defending ARCA Racing Series runner-up Dalton Sargeant, who is set to run full-time, and will run the #25 in honor of his childhood hero, the late Tim Richmond. Daytona will mark just his seventh series start.

#3-Jordan Anderson Racing
NEW TEAM
On January 31, Jordan Anderson arrived at the NASCAR Hall of Fame to announce the formation of his own new Truck Series team. Thanks to the efforts of several fans through his SponsorJordan.com campaign, Anderson will field a #3 Toyota full-time in 2018, making the switch from Chevrolet. Bommarito Auto Group, LTi Printing, Lucas Oil, Jacob Companies, and Knight Fire return as sponsors. The team has four trucks ready for the season ahead.

#4, #46, #51-Kyle Busch Motorsports
DRIVER CHANGE
With Christopher Bell moving to the XFINITY Series, KBM’s #4 Toyota will now be split between Todd Gilliland, his father David Gilliland, and Busch himself. Todd’s first start will come at Martinsville, and will take on a larger part of the schedule when he turns eighteen in May. The driver lineups for the #46 and #51 will be split among Harrison Burton, Brandon Jones, Spencer Davis, Riley Herbst, and Busch.

#13, #41, #88, #98-ThorSport Racing
MANUFACTURER & DRIVER CHANGE
On January 22, ThorSport announced they would be switching manufacturers from Toyota to Ford, and have acquired several trucks from the closed Brad Keselowski Racing to help with the transition. Matt Crafton returns to the #88 and Grant Enfinger will run the #98. Ben Rhodes will drive the #41, using the Owner Points he collected last year in ThorSport’s #27. On February 7, Myatt Snider was announced as driver of the #13, making the move from Kyle Busch Motorsports and bringing sponsorship from Liberty Tax.

#15, #49-Premium Motorsports
DRIVER CHANGE
On January 23, Premium Motorsports announced that Robby Lyons will run full-time in the Truck Series in 2018. Lyons will drive the #15, a second truck Premium debuted late last season after acquiring the assets from Tommy Baldwin’s joint venture with Stewart Friesen. The other Premium truck, #49, will remain with Wendell Chavous with new sponsorship from Sobriety Nation for the full season. Premium’s fleet of trucks have been prepared by Brian Keselowski, who has tweeted updates over the offseason.

#16-Hattori Racing
DRIVER CHANGE
With Ryan Truex making the move from the Truck Series to full-time in XFINITY, Hattori’s 2018 driver is Brett Moffitt, as announced on February 7.

#17-DGR-CROSLEY
NEW TEAM
On a very busy January 22, David Gilliland announced that his own team would merge with the CROSLEY Sports Group to form DGR-CROSLEY. The team has acquired trucks from Red Horse Racing, whose team closed its doors last season. On January 25, it was revealed they would also campaign Red Horse’s former car number, #17. Driving that Toyota in five races will be Chris Eggleston, who hasn’t run Trucks since 2014, but has had great success on Bill McAnally Racing’s K&N Pro Series West team.

#22, #45-Niece Motorsports
DRIVER CHANGE
Justin Fontaine will go full-time in 2018 driving Al Niece’s #45 Superior Essex Chevrolet, and will be teamed with Austin Wayne Self, who joined late last year, in the #22 Don’t Mess With Texas Chevrolet. It will be the third different team Self has driven for in the last year, following turns with his family’s Toyota team and Martins Motorsports. On February 2, it was announced that Max McLaughlin, son of longtime XFINITY Series driver Mike McLaughlin, will also drive for Niece a minimum of four races in 2018.

#52-Halmar-Friesen Racing
RETURNING
The Halmar-Friesen effort will once again run full-time this year with Stewart Friesen driving the #52. The team will continue their partnership with GMS Racing, which started late last season.

#57-Norm Benning Racing
RETURNING (?)
Senica has posted several tweets over the offseason, indicating he is not only returning to Norm Benning Racing in the #57 alongside Benning’s #6, but will be running a number of different sponsors: Cowboy Coffee Chew, Betty Lou’s, and Pennsylvania Power Products, Inc. (the latter having sponsored him in the closing months of 2017).

#83-Copp Motorsports
DRIVER CHANGE & NEW PARTNERSHIP
On February 6, it was announced that Copp Motorsports' #83 Chevrolet would return in 2018 with Scott Stenzel driving, thanks to a partnership with E2 Northeast Motorsports. Stenzel aims to make his first Truck Series start since 2014, when he finished 33rd in the season finale at Homestead.

CLOSED: #19, #29-Brad Keselowski Racing
The series’ flagship Ford team closed at the end of last season, a year which saw both its drivers Austin Cindric and Chase Briscoe go to victory lane.

CLOSED: #44-Martins Motorsports
On December 30, just eleven days after a tweet showing off a new engine, Tommy Joe Martins announced that his single-truck operation would be closing its doors.

Saturday, February 17, 2018
XFINITY Race 1 of 33
PowerShares QQQ 300 at Daytona
2017 Last-Place Finisher: David Starr

#0, 01, #4, #15-JD Motorsports
DRIVER & SPONSOR CHANGE
After running a handful of races for JD Motorsports last year, Vinnie Miller will go full-time with the team this year. Ten of his starts will be sponsored by JAS Expedited Trucking, which backed BK Racing’s Cup effort in a few races last year. On February 7, it was revealed Garrett Smithley will return to the team's #0 with Ross Chastain likely to return to the #4. A fourth car, the #15 to be driven by Matt Mills, was announced on February 2, and will debut next week in at Atlanta.

#2, #3, #21-Richard Childress Racing
DRIVER CHANGES
On January 24, it was revealed that Richard Childress Racing’s #3 team would see five different drivers: Austin Dillon, Ty Dillon, Jeb Burton, Brendan Gaughan, and ARCA driver Shane Lee. This rounds out a three-car lineup for RCR with Matt Tifft in the #2 Anderson’s Maple Syrup Chevrolet, moving over from Joe Gibbs Racing, and Daniel Hemric, who takes on Gaughan’s sponsor South Point Hotel & Casino for the #21 Chevrolet. Ben Kennedy, who last year made nine of his seventeen starts in RCR’s #2, was on January 30 announced as the new General Manager of the Camping World Truck Series.

#8, #78, #99-B.J. McLeod Motorsports
DRIVER CHANGES
On January 20, B.J. McLeod Motorsports announced they would retain their three-car lineup from 2017, as well as their Daytona lineup. Joining the #8 of Caesar Bacarella, who ran a handful of races late last season, are Ryan Ellis in the #78 and Ray Black, Jr. in the #99. On January 24, Ellis revealed that Densify Cloud Optimization will sponsor his #78 at Daytona.

#11-Kaulig Racing
DRIVER CHANGE
On January 9, Ryan Truex was announced as the replacement for Blake Koch at Kaulig Racing. Truex makes the move from Hattori Racing in the Truck Series. To mark the occasion, Truex has updated his popular “go ryan” t-shirts to show his new ride.

#18, #19, #20-Joe Gibbs Racing
DRIVER CHANGES
While JGR’s #18 will see most of its schedule go to Cup regulars, Ryan Preece will make ten starts this season with sponsorship from Rheem. He’ll be teamed with Brandon Jones, who moves from RCR to drive the #19 Menards Toyota, and Christopher Bell, who after splitting time with Trucks last year goes full-time in the #20.

#24 & #28-JGL Racing
DRIVER & MANUFACTURER CHANGE
JGL Racing brings back the #28 team which suspended operations after last September in Kentucky, leaving Dakoda Armstrong without a ride. The car, which also makes the switch from Toyota to Ford, will be driven by Dylan Lupton, who ran JGL’s #24 in fourteen races last year. On February 7, thinQ Technology Partners signed with Lupton's #28. Driving the #24 this year is Kaz Grala, who makes the move from GMS Racing’s Truck Series team.

#35-Go FAS Racing
NEW TEAM
In addition to their Cup Series effort with Matt DiBenedetto in the #32, Go FAS Racing team owner Archie St. Hilaire is returning to the XFINITY Series for the first time since the 2013 finale at Homestead. On January 5, the team announced that the new #35 will be driven by Joey Gase, who brings with him sponsorship from Sparks Energy, Inc. His vibrant paint job, as well as Ryan Ellis’ aforementioned Densify #78, were both designed by Go FAS Racing’s artist David Marrero. For Gase, things go full circle – Jimmy Means Racing, which he left at the end of 2017, hired him from Hilaire’s XFINITY team in 2012.

#42-Chip Ganassi Racing
DRIVER CHANGE
After exceeding expectations in the Truck Series with his father’s team, NEMCO Motorsports, John Hunter Nemechek has landed a part-time effort with Chip Ganassi Racing’s XFINITY effort for 2018. Announced on December 12, Nemechek, who brings with him sponsorship from Fire Alarm Services, Inc., will share the ride with Cup regular Kyle Larson.

#45, #55-JP Motorsports
NEW TEAM
Joining the XFINITY Series in 2018 is JP Motorsports, founded by Jerry and Phyllis Hattaway from California. Announced on January 18, the team acquired cars from TriStar Motorsports. The team made the announcement on January 22 that Stephen Leicht would drive the #55. A second team was revealed February 5 with Josh Bilicki driving full-time with returning sponsor Prevagen as his full-time backer in the #45.

#52-Jimmy Means Racing
DRIVER CHANGE
On February 7, Jimmy Means Racing announced that David Starr will drive the #52 Chevrolet this year, replacing Joey Gase, who was released at the end of 2017. Last year, Starr drove the B.J. McLeod / SS-Green Light #99 in XFINITY and rounded out the Cup schedule with Motorsports Business Management's #66.

#60-Roush-Fenway Racing
DRIVER LINEUP CHANGE
Roush-Fenway Racing’s driver development car sees Ty Majeski once again in the lineup after his debut season last year. Joining him to divide up the season are Austin Cindric and Chase Briscoe, both moving from the Truck Series after the closure of Brad Keselowski Racing. Cindric is the team’s listed driver for Daytona, and will run four of the season’s first five races. From there, Cindric will split the season between the Roush-Fenway #60 and either the #12 or #22 from Penske Racing, patching together a full-time effort between the two teams in a similar manner to the late Joe Weatherly in the 1963 Cup season.

#74-Mike Harmon Racing
SPONSOR CHANGE
Mike Harmon returns with his Dodge this year. On February 7, it was revealed that another military initiative will be on the hood, the Shadow Warriors Project.

#76-SS Green Light Racing
DRIVER & NUMBER CHANGE
SS Green Light Racing’s #07 is now the #76. Driving in place of Ray Black, Jr., who is now running Cup for Rick Ware Racing, is Spencer Boyd, who brings with him sponsorship from Grunt Style, which backed him in a few races last year.

#86-Brandonbilt Motorsports
RETURNING
(UPDATE: Feb. 9) Brandon Brown's family team returns to XFINITY for the first time since 2016. Brown's #86 Chevrolet for Daytona has several associate sponsors, including ConoCoin, Brio.TV, the Dan Marino Foundation, and True Timber.

#93, #??, #??-RSS Racing
RETURNING
On January 24, RSS Racing announced they would continue their three-car lineup from late 2017 with both Ryan Sieg and defending LASTCAR champion Jeff Green among the three drivers. On January 26, it was revealed that Ryan Sieg would drive the #93, as he did last year at Homestead, and landed a twelve-race sponsorship deal from Code Rum, the Homestead sponsor.

#98, #00-Stewart-Haas Racing with Biagi-DenBeste
TEAM PARTNERSHIP
Stewart-Haas Racing has partnered with part-timers Biagi-DenBeste Racing in 2018 to form “Stewart-Haas Racing with Biagi-DenBeste.” As a result, Kevin Harvick will be in the team’s #98 for five races, starting in Atlanta, and teammate Cole Custer in the #00 will receive added support for his full-time effort.

CLOSED: #46-Precision Performance Motorsports
On January 18, PPM announced they would be shutting down their XFINITY Series program. Quin Houff, who drove in many of the team’s starts last year, will be competing in ARCA.

Sunday, February 18, 2018
CUP Race 1 of 36
Daytona 500 at Daytona
2017 Last-Place Finisher: Matt Kenseth

ENTRY LIST
Posted just yesterday, February 8, the preliminary entry list for the Daytona 500 stands at exactly 40 cars, marking the first time in the race's 60-year history that not a single car will fail to qualify. As of this writing, the list includes BK Racing's #23 as team owner Ron Devine still holds the team's Charter. However, with continuing reports of financial troubles and legal proceedings, it's yet unclear whether that team will actually race. If they miss out, and no other team takes their place, the resulting 39-car field will be the smallest in 500 history.

#7-Danica Patrick
DRIVER & SPONSOR CHANGE
Released by Stewart-Haas Racing at the end of last season, Patrick announced she would run the Daytona 500 and Indianapolis 500 in 2018, then retire. On January 18, GoDaddy returned from a two-year hiatus to sponsor Patrick’s effort, and on January 22, Premium Motorsports hired Patrick to drive. She will run car #7, the same number she raced in IndyCar with Andretti Autosport as well as the XFINITY Series. She will also be locked-in to the 500, thanks to Premium’s Charter for the #15, run for much of last year by Reed Sorenson. And she’ll have a pit crew trained by Richard Childress Racing.

#9-Chase Elliott
NUMBER CHANGE
After two seasons running Hendrick Motorsports’ #24, Jeff Gordon’s heir-apparent will now run the #9 his father Bill made famous at Melling Racing, and Chase himself drove to the XFINITY Championship. Elliott retains his Owner Points from 2017 earned in the #24.

#10-Aric Almirola
DRIVER & SPONSOR CHANGE
After six full seasons with Richard Petty Motorsports, Aric Almirola and sponsor Smithfield have made the move to Stewart-Haas Racing, replacing Danica Patrick.

#12-Ryan Blaney
NEW TEAM
For the first time since 2010, Penske Racing returns to three full-time Cup teams. Joining Brad Keselowski and Joey Logano is Blaney, a lateral move from his Penske-supported ride at Wood Brothers Racing. Blaney is locked-in this season thanks to the Charter acquired from Greg Biffle’s shuttered #16 team at Roush-Fenway Racing.

#20-Erik Jones
DRIVER CHANGE
The defending Rookie of the Year, Jones makes the move from Furniture Row Racing’s second team (now closed) to the second-oldest team at Joe Gibbs Racing. Jones replaces Matt Kenseth who, unable to secure a quality ride after five seasons in the #20, is not expected to race this season.

#21-Paul Menard
DRIVER CHANGE
With Ryan Blaney moving to Penske Racing, Paul Menard will take his place at Wood Brothers Racing. Menard makes the move from Richard Childress Racing’s #27 Chevrolet, which he’s driven every season since the team debuted in 2011. Sponsorship from Menards has followed the driver to the #21, as well as Blaney’s #12. On January 15, it was announced the team will hold the Charter from Go FAS Racing’s #32.

#24-William Byron
DRIVER CHANGE
With Chase Elliott running the #9, defending XFINITY Series Champion William Byron takes the controls of Hendrick Motorsports’ #24 Chevrolet. The team will use the Charter and Owner Points from Hendrick’s #5, the team’s very first car number in 1984, which ran its last race at Homestead.

#30-The Motorsports Group
LOST CHARTER
After a difficult 2017 season in spite of acquiring a Charter from Circle Sport (#33) and sponsorship from Hulu, The Motorsports Group is once again an Open team in 2018. Circle Sport pulled its Charter on December 12, and Hulu pulled its funding. As of January 7, Earnhardt was still looking for sponsorship for 2018. Sponsorship was found by January 30, when it was announced he’d be moving to StarCom Racing for the Daytona 500. As of this writing, the team's status is unknown. They are not entered in the Daytona 500, and are not expected to run the remaining three restrictor-plate races unless a sponsor is found. They do, however, plan to run the remaining 32 races, starting next Sunday in Atlanta.

#32-Matt DiBenedetto
CHARTER & SPONSOR CHANGE
With Go FAS Racing’s Charter leased to Wood Brothers Racing, the #32 team has entered into a partnership with Circle Sport, which parted ways with The Motorsports Group’s #33 Chevrolet of Jeffrey Earnhardt last season. A new David Marrero paint scheme was revealed on February 6 where DiBenedetto’s #32 will promote the upcoming Rob Cohen film “The Hurricane Heist” in the Daytona 500.

#34-Michael McDowell
DRIVER CHANGE
After parting ways with Leavine Family Racing’s #95, McDowell moves to the Front Row Motorsports #34, replacing Landon Cassill. The team retains sponsorship from Love’s Travel Stops, and also welcomes K-LOVE Radio, which has sponsored McDowell for much of the last decade. The K-LOVE scheme will run in five races in 2018.

#37-Chris Buescher
CHARTER CHANGE
Chris Buescher remains with JTG-Daugherty Racing for a second season, but his leased Charter from the #16 Roush-Fenway Racing team has since been moved to Penske Racing’s #12. Buescher will still be locked-in, however, as JTG purchased the Charter from the closed #77 Furniture Row Racing team.

#38-David Ragan
SPONSOR CHANGE
Leading off the backers for Ragan’s ride at Front Row Motorsports is speedco, revealed on February 5.

#42-Kyle Larson
SPONSOR CHANGE
The Target branding that has been with Chip Ganassi Racing in both open wheel and stock car competition for years has now left the team completely. In its place, Larson’s sponsors will include CreditOne and DC Solar, the latter shared with teammate Jamie McMurray.

#43-Darrell Wallace, Jr.
DRIVER, SPONSOR, & MANUFACTURER CHANGE
With Aric Almirola moving to Stewart-Haas Racing’s #10 and taking Smithfield’s sponsorship with him, Darrell “Bubba” Wallace, Jr. returns to Richard Petty Motorsports for the first time since his relief duty with the team last season. On top of returning sponsorship from the U.S. Air Force and STP, Click ‘n Close has come on to back the car at Daytona. The team has also switched manufacturers from Ford to Chevrolet, thanks to a new partnership with Richard Childress Racing. The team has also leased its Charter to Rick Ware Racing, and will instead use the Charter from RPM’s second team (#44) that closed at the end of 2016.

#51-Justin Marks
ACQUIRED CHARTER & SPONSOR
Ray Black, Jr. drove the Rick Ware Racing #51 in a few races last fall, and was originally reported to be returning to the team for a Rookie of the Year bid in 2018. On February 2, however, it was revealed that Justin Marks will drive in his place with sponsorship from Harry’s Shaving Products and Katerra. Marks last ran Cup at Talladega last fall, when he crashed early and finished last. Marks will run only a limited schedule for Ware in 2018, leaving the remainder of the schedule open for other drivers. The Ware #51 also has additional sponsorship from Keen’s Buildings, which signed on January 22, and have leased a Charter from Richard Petty Motorsports’ #43, locking them in after being an Open team last year.

#52-Rick Ware Racing
NEW TEAM
In addition, the Ware team will field a second car in eight to ten races this season. Ware’s #52 will be driven by some of his 2017 roster, including B.J. McLeod, Cody Ware, and Kyle Weatherman, plus road racer John Graham, who eyes his Cup debut. As of this writing, this second Ware car is not entered in the Daytona 500.

#62-Brendan Gaughan
NUMBER CHANGE
On January 8, it was revealed Gaughan and Beard Motorsports will return to run the same four-race restrictor-plate schedule in 2018. Per the paint scheme release on January 10, the team changes car numbers from #75 to the #62 that Gaughan drove for much of his Truck and XFINITY Series careers. The car will also carry sponsorship from the Gaughan family’s South Point Hotel & Casino in a new, more vibrant paint scheme.

#66-Mark Thompson
RETURNING
After last year’s Cup debut, Carl Long’s team Motorsports Business Management returns to action this year. The team has acquired at least one Ford from Richard Petty Motorsports to drive at Daytona. Behind the wheel will be Mark Thompson, who last fall at Talladega made his first Cup start since 1992. Thompson does not have a Charter, and will look to improve on his short run before a crash last fall. Expect Carl Long and Timmy Hill to run the team’s Chevrolets in selected races later this year.

#72-Corey LaJoie
DRIVER AND SPONSOR CHANGE
After a difficult rookie season with BK Racing, Corey LaJoie revealed on January 22 a Chevrolet he would drive in 2018. On February 6, it was revealed that car was TriStar Motorsports’ #72, which he will share with Cole Whitt in 2018. Whitt stated he’s going to scale back to a part-time effort in order to spend more time with his family. LaJoie will drive the #72 at Daytona with sponsorship from Schulter Systems coming over from LaJoie’s time at BK Racing. The team remains locked-in with the leased Charter from Front Row Motorsports.

#88-Alex Bowman
DRIVER CHANGE
Alex Bowman returns to full-time Cup competition, driving in place of the retired Dale Earnhardt, Jr. in the Hendrick Motorsports #88. Bowman, who struggled through two seasons with BK Racing and Tommy Baldwin Racing, enjoyed a breakout performance relieving Earnhardt at Phoenix in 2016, and also finished 3rd in his first Clash appearance last year. On January 30, it was announced that Valvoline will sponsor the #88 team in two races for the next five years.

#92-David Gilliland
NEW TEAM (IN CUP)
On January 17, it was announced that Ricky Benton Racing, a part-time Truck Series team, will attempt to make their Cup debut in the Daytona 500. Selected to drive is David Gilliland, whose plate race expertise includes a pole in the 2007 Daytona 500 and a runner-up at Talladega in 2013. As in Trucks, the team will run a Ford with sponsorship from Black’s Tire and Auto Service and Carquest Auto Parts. They do not have a Charter. The #92 hasn’t started a Cup race since 2011 at Bristol, and hasn’t made the Daytona 500 since that same season, when Brian Keselowski drove a rebuilt Evernham Dodge from 2006.

#95-Kasey Kahne
DRIVER CHANGE
Released by Hendrick Motorsports after six years in the #5 car, Kahne moves over to Leavine Family Racing, replacing Michael McDowell. The team’s Camaro also has a new look this season, the “Lightning McQueen” style yellow numbers replaced by a new font. Sources indicate Kahne was one of many personnel changes at LFR over the offseason. Some of the sponsors which came aboard the previous year, including Procore, have returned for 2018.

#96-D.J. Kennington
RETURNING
Gaunt Brothers Racing broke through last year as the team and Canadian driver D.J. Kennington made their first starts in the Daytona 500. After subsequently failing to qualify at Talladega, GBR scaled back, and Kennington pieced together a partial schedule with Premium Motorsports. Now, for the first time since last fall’s Truck Series round in Mosport, driver and team are back together, and again looking to make the 500. In this announcement, made January 22, they will have to do so as an Open team.

#00-Jeffrey Earnhardt
DRIVER & SPONSOR CHANGE
Cope and his new start-up team, StarCom Racing, return to action in Daytona after starting two races late last year. This time, they have a Charter, as on January 24 it was revealed they have leased the Charter from RCR’s #27 team, formerly driven by Paul Menard. What looked to be Cope’s first appearance as a driver in the Daytona 500 since 2004 changed on January 30, when it was announced that Jeffrey Earnhardt will be coming over from Circle Sport with The Motorsports Group to drive the #00 at Daytona with sponsorship from VRX Simulators. Following the retirement of Dale Earnhardt, Jr. this will mark the 40th straight 500 with an Earnhardt in the field.

MISSING: Landon Cassill, David Starr
Setting aside Dale Earnhardt, Jr.’s retirement and Matt Kenseth electing to miss his first Daytona 500 since 1999, Cassill and Starr are two drivers from the 2017 Cup finale at Homestead not entered in this year’s Daytona 500. While Starr has since landed an XFINITY Series ride with Jimmy Means Racing, Cassill lost his ride in the Front Row Motorsports #34 to Michael McDowell, and has yet to be picked up.

STATUS UNKNOWN: #23 & #83-BK Racing
BK Racing’s financial troubles caught up to them over the offseason. The Open team, #83, isn't entered, and the #23 is entered with driver and sponsor to be announced. The Charter for the #23 still remains with team owner Ron Devine, pending a hearing to take place on February 15. (UPDATE FEB. 9: The #23 is at the track, all white without any primary or associate sponsora, and  word is Gray Gaulding will drive.)

CLOSED: #27-Richard Childress Racing
Richard Childress announced he would not be fielding the #27 Chevrolet that Paul Menard drove from 2011-2017. Menard and his sponsor have moved to Wood Brothers Racing while the Charter has been leased to StarCom Racing.

CLOSED: #77-Furniture Row Racing
The second FRR team closed at the end of the 2017 season, and its Charter was sold to #37-JTG Daugherty Racing. Erik Jones now drives the #20 from Joe Gibbs Racing.

LASTCAR STAT OF THE WEEK
Only one time in NASCAR history has the last-place finisher of a points race fallen out because of a “battery” issue. It happened on July 1, 2000, when the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series raced at the Milwaukee Mile for the Sears DieHard 200. Finishing last that day was Bonham, Texas native B.A. Wilson, who pulled off the track after 33 laps in his #73 Sonntag Redi-Mix Chevrolet.

#JD70: The Busch Clash of '79

J.D. McDuffie's 1979 Oldsmobile
PHOTO: Dave Westerman & Larry Harrell

LASTCAR.info will be making a few changes this season, including “Entry List Storylines,” which returns this Friday with a new format.

The biggest change will be to “Throwback Thursday,” which will end this July in order to allow more time to promote my new book, J.D.: The Life and Death of a Forgotten NASCAR Legend. From now until the July 15 release, the segment will move to Wednesdays, and will focus on McDuffie’s career at each track on the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series circuit, both past and present. Included will be pictures and information that didn’t quite make the cut into my book.

Today’s feature will be one of the shortest, as it involves a race where McDuffie made just one start, but an important one nonetheless. It’s perhaps appropriate that this series starts with one of the biggest accomplishments of McDuffie’s career: making the inaugural running of what is now the Advance Auto Parts Clash at Daytona.

Back then, the “Busch Clash of ’79,” as it was known, was invite-only, restricted to only the pole winners of the previous season. McDuffie’s lightning-quick lap at Dover the previous September made him the ninth and final driver to make the cut. Cale Yarborough, just coming off his third-consecutive Winston Cup, had scored a series-leading eight, including the last three poles in a row. David Pearson’s Wood Brothers Mercury picked up another seven. Buddy Baker, who went on to dominate much of that SpeedWeeks, qualified by taking just one – 1978’s spring race at Dover.

McDuffie always preferred racing Chevrolets, but this time around, crew chief Jimmy Byrd prepared him an Oldsmobile, which at the time had become the go-to car for many teams on superspeedways. The car would also run Goodyear tires – the McCreary tires he ran at Dover the previous year weren’t strong enough to run at Daytona. In fact, they weren’t really meant for Dover, either, and fell apart so quickly that it contributed to his disappointing 33rd-place finish. Qualifying wouldn’t be an issue for The Clash, as the nine competitors drew for position by reaching into an ice bucket for numbered cans of Busch Beer. He drew the fifth spot.

The first iteration of the Clash was a literal sprint race – just twenty laps with the winner earning $50,000. Unfortunately, McDuffie never contended. He slipped out of the inside line before the leaders entered Turn 1, and had lost touch with the draft down the backstretch. He ended up pulling off the track with three laps to go. Though citing engine trouble, the true culprit had been a burned-out bearing.

That day, McDuffie became the first driver ever to fail to finish the Busch Clash. It remains the only time car #70 has ever started the event (including this year). But he took home $10,000 for his effort, nearly twice as much money he’d earned from any one race the previous season. He’d earn another $4,470 the following week, when he finished 25th in the Daytona 500.

OPINION: The Clash is the real “Daytona Day”

PHOTO: Catchfence

“Daytona Day” is the stupidest ad campaign NASCAR and its broadcasting partners have ever come up with. I used to say it was well-meaning, but I don’t even believe that anymore. Both versions of the ad give me the impression NASCAR is trying to trick people into watching the race. Very little racing footage is used, nor do we see the faces and names of its many new drivers. I get the feeling the networks are embarrassed by the product they’re promoting, or think that nobody would care if they saw the sport for what it is. I can’t abide that.

First of all, let’s get literal. There is no Daytona “Day.” In fact, if you live on the west coast, the Daytona 500’s over by lunch. And I ain’t never been to one of those backyard parties with all my NASCAR fan friends. Yes, it would be great if there was a day to celebrate racing. But, if that day’s ever going to come, we need to be transparent about what racing actually is, and that it’s worth being a part of it.

The biggest problem with “Daytona Day” is it misrepresents the 500 as an event run in isolation. Sure, longtime fans aren’t fooled, but as we’ve been constantly told, the ad isn’t for us. For the uninitiated, the 500 is actually the grand finale of SpeedWeeks, which is a whole series of practices, qualifiers, and races involving four different national touring series in the world of stock car racing. To skip all that just to watch the main event is like skipping all of the Olympics just to watch the Closing Ceremonies. It’s the context, the history, and the story lines developing through SpeedWeeks, that makes the event as special as it is.

Some have said that it’s not practical to promote these other races, that only existing race fans watch them. To them, I ask – isn’t that the point of all this? Last I checked, NASCAR is trying to turn people into race fans. Also, didn’t FOX and its partners pay billions of dollars to cover the first half of the season, including much of SpeedWeeks? Why tell everyone to wait until the very last four of their hours of coverage to tune in, at the cost of lost ad revenue? This isn’t a situation like the NFL or MLB, where the lead-up to the championship covers several weeks where fans tune in and out. In NASCAR, it’s just a matter of days – certainly a manageable time frame for any media conglomerate.

The fact is, SpeedWeeks is itself the best way of promoting the races in Daytona. Big Bill France made it that way on purpose. The Duels were never necessary to set the starting lineup for the 500 – they were simply tacked-on to the schedule to give fans more action to watch between qualifying and the main event. Each race ran fewer cars for a shorter distance, giving fans a taste of the action they could expect on Sunday.

In 1979, the action started even earlier with The Clash, which ran an even shorter distance with even fewer cars. Debuting the same year that CBS began its live coverage, new Hall of Fame member Ken Squier often called The Clash an “appetizer” for the main course of the 500. The rest of the week did, in fact, play out like a three-course meal: there was now a clear progression through the week from a 20-lap Clash to two 50-lap qualifiers, then the 200-lap 500.

The current schedule, which includes ARCA, Trucks, and XFINITY, are also largely organized from shortest to longest with none of these races longer than the 500. Like The Clash and The Duels, each serves as a stand-alone event which also promotes the next. With this infrastructure already in place, why go out of your way to replace it with a lame hashtag?

This is also why I chafe at the offseason countdown to the Daytona 500. Not in the same way Denny Hamlin does, but because The Clash, run one week earlier, should be promoted as the proper start of NASCAR season.

The Clash also trumps “Daytona Day” as the best way to attract new fans. Unlike the 500, it’s short, and thus more likely to hold short attention spans. It also has fewer rules than later events. It showcases the top drivers in the sport. It throws in just enough action that you may be curious what happens in the next race. And, when it’s over, you’ll have a good idea whether or not racing is for you. If it does, maybe the 500 won’t even be enough for you. Maybe you’ll look ahead to Atlanta, and pretty soon, you’re a race fan.

So, FOX, before you get to work on 2019’s “Daytona Day” ad – maybe move that day up a week, and invite people to try NASCAR’s appetizer.

COMMENTARY: Brock’s Starting Grid Network, Ten Years Later

Last fall, I produced a video on YouTube introducing the starting lineup for the season finale at Homestead. Next month, I will set the lineup again for the Daytona 500, marking the tenth anniversary of the first such video I ever made.

I'd planned on simply telling the story of those videos. But when I started writing it out, the more I found it tied to other NASCAR-related projects I've done over the years, and other things that have happened in my life. It ended up turning into an autobiography covering the last few years. It wasn't my intention, but these things happen in writing sometimes.

I’ve followed NASCAR since I was eight, and for much of that time, my favorite part was when the announcer introduced the starting lineup. I admired the artistry of CBS’ Ken Squier and ESPN’s Bob Jenkins, among others, who built up the anticipation by walking me through the grid one row at a time. The graphics, the music, and the clever way of conveying information, including what each car in the field looked like, always stayed with me.

It was still with me in late 2005, when I was at a crossroads in my own career. A year out of college, I was working in retail and trying to figure out what I wanted to do in life. In between shifts, I escaped into my passion for both NASCAR and creative writing, trying my best to mesh the two together. I began this journey too late to take advantage of internships in college, and getting into journalism school proved as difficult as getting into law school. Looking to follow my father’s footsteps into law, I’d applied to eight different schools, only to be rejected from all of them. Like so many others my age, I looked to the internet for a chance to make something out of my passion.

It was the start of a journey that continues to this day.

WIN ON SUNDAY, SING ON MONDAY

It started in February 2006 with my first blog, where I wrote poems that reviewed what happened in each Cup Series race. The working title was “NASCAR Tourette’s.” I wasn't intending to make light of the condition; I only considered it because it was the nickname my college roommates gave me for yelling at my TV each Sunday. For obvious reasons, I changed the name to “Karaoke for NASCAR Fans,” or KFNF.

The logo for "Karaoke for NASCAR Fans."

In place of poems, which I didn't really have a passion for, KFNF turned into giving songs the Weird Al treatment, like musical race reviews. My thought was, with iPods as popular as they were, this could be a way for fans to follow the season’s action along with their playlists. I enjoyed the effort it took to twist everything from Queen’s “Bicycle Race” to Tennessee Ernie Ford’s “Sixteen Tons” into something understandable. 

The biggest fans of KFNF, as it turned out, were Dennis Michelson and Lori Munro, co-hosts of the weekly “Doin’ Donuts” radio show on RaceTalkRadio.com (RTR). In late 2006, I became a regular guest on their show, where I would sing my lyrics over the phone. This was a challenge I should have expected, but hadn’t. I couldn’t sing a note, and I’d always imagined other people would sing them instead. It was also a logistical challenge – it was impossible to sync up a backing track over the phone. But Dennis and Lori were always good sports about it.

KFNF never found an audience outside of RTR, receiving double-digit hits for each time-consuming article. After two and a half years of weekly updates and a declining music selection, I shut it down.

A new race review segment grew organically from RTR, called “Barney and Me.” This time, during my weekly appearances, I would do a pretend play-by-play of each Cup Series race, speaking half of the lines by impersonating the late Barney Hall. Once again, I was working outside my comfort zone – impersonations were no more my “bread and butter” than singing – but I enjoyed writing the skits, and the segment was a hit on the show. I even produced a “Barney and Me” Christmas Special called “The Sleighbell Showdown,” where “Barney” and myself called a race among Santa’s reindeer. The clip is still in the RTR archives.

I was a regular guest on “Doin’ Donuts” for nearly five years, and Dennis and Lori have been good friends of mine ever since. It was my first exposure to live broadcasting, and I soon joined the hosts in discussing topics from week to week. Years earlier, I’d always dreaded any kind of performance, from recitals to school presentations. I’d thought about taking a class on stage fright. After RTR, it didn't seem necessary.

A CHILDREN’S BOOK

In early 2007, I looked into a third option – producing a NASCAR children’s book. My objective was to create an illustrated NASCAR history book with big, multi-colored drawings of key moments in the sport’s history. I’d done something similar in 2001, where I made little doodles of key moments during the Cup Series season in pen and colored pencil. I’d made similar doodles on KFNF, as well as a chalkboard-painted door in my parent’s garage, where I drew the cars my brother and I picked for our fantasy racing league.

The "spectacular crashes" page from my
unpublished children's book, depicting
the accidents as garbage dumped
from a can.

In the children’s book, my drawings represented different exciting aspects of the sport: first-time winners, photo finishes, and famous races. What started as random collages turned into more creative pictures, including one of a garbage can dumping out drawings of some of NASCAR’s most spectacular crashes and a bowl of “Champions” cereal where different Cup Series champion-winning cars were represented by car-shaped marshmallows. After writing a couple lines on each picture, I submitted copies of the manuscript to NASCAR at the end of the 2007 season. I never heard anything back.

Once again, there was much learned from the experience. Prior to the book, I’d only been interested in the part of NASCAR history I remembered growing up, from 1988 to the present day. The project forced me to dig deeper and gain a better appreciation for the sport’s early years, and moments that weren’t talked about as much. Though the book stalled, I felt that I left it with a better understanding of NASCAR itself.

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN

When the book fell through, I did have a “Plan B,” – or, I guess, “D.” With the 50th Annual Daytona 500 coming up the next February, I thought it would be fun to make a starting grid video of my own to introduce the lineup. I’d grown dissatisfied with the grids used on the post-2001 networks, which I felt the producers treated as an afterthought. I particularly didn’t like how the grids didn’t even show the cars (and still don't today).

The grid idea had been coming together for some time. During my KFNF years, I’d even found the song CBS used for their lineup in 1990 and 1991 – “Las Vegas,” Hans Zimmer’s track from the soundtrack to “Rain Man.” There was just one problem: I had no idea how to make a video.

My current YouTube channel was registered in 2006 under my old AOL handle “nadeau1064,” which I picked when I was a card-carrying member of the Jerry Nadeau Fan Club. By early 2008, the channel featured a series of NASCAR clips that are laughable by today’s standards. I didn’t know anything about video editing or DVD ripping, so when I wanted to upload a clip, I just pointed my digital camera at my computer screen, turned the volume all the way up, and hoped no one walked into the room. Those fuzzy clips are still on the channel today. One clip of Jeff Gordon was even used in a video made by the Sonoma Raceway.

My computer at the time was an old laptop I’d had since I went to college in 2001, a bulky Compaq Presario with a nearly square screen. Heading into SpeedWeeks 2008, the computer was overheating constantly, requiring a USB-powered cool mat to keep it from shutting down. But it was on this computer that I made my first NASCAR Starting Grid, as well as every other video I posted into early 2009. It still runs today, and in 2015 was used in my short-lived “Fantasy Racing Series” on YouTube.

The first starting grid format, using the 1988 CBS template.

While clicking around one night, I found a screenshot someone else posted from the 1988 Daytona 500 starting grid, as it aired on CBS. I saved the picture and examined the video on YouTube. Looking at it critically, I realized that the grid “animation” back then was more of a slideshow than a video, so all I needed to do was alter an image one part at a time, then arrange them in the right order. While I was taking a class on Photoshop at the time, I didn’t have that program at first. Instead, I used MS Paint, and made a template out of the screenshot. The best font I had at the time was “Kristy,” which I felt was bold and clear enough to use on the video.

Driver photos were easy enough to gather with a Google search, though some were better than others. The picture I used for Tony Stewart showed him scowling at someone across the garage. Car photos, however, were going to be a challenge. Again, I didn’t know anything about making my own screencaps or even how to record something on TV, so I relied on what had served me on YouTube – the digital camera. And so, on the day of Pole Qualifying for the Daytona 500, I sat hunched in front of my TV, finger on the shutter, and manually snapped pictures of every car during their lap. These pictures were then cropped to fit my template and sorted out. While the driver pictures fit the template well, I mistakenly scrunched the car photos to fit, making each car look like a Volkswagen. While I fixed that cropping issue soon after, I would continue to use the camera this way for the next four seasons. This was often the most stressful aspect of making the grids, as oftentimes the broadcasts didn’t show every car. This was also the time where full-season sponsorships were becoming a thing of a past, requiring that I keep a massive catalog of paint schemes.

After Thursday’s qualifying races, I took out a sheet of binder paper, wrote the numbers “1” to “22” down the margin, and filled in the starting order on either side of each number. The rest of the sheet would be used to take notes during the race, something I had started for a new blog that would debut alongside my video. This site, “43 Stories,” would each week feature an annotated full-race rundown with notes on what happened to every driver in the race. The idea, which has since been replicated on other sites, was another imperfect one. No matter how complete my notes were, there were always two or three drivers without any notes. That site, too, would fall by the wayside after just one season. It was simply too much work for an unsatisfactory product.

With the starting lineup set, it was time to write my script. I tried my best to replicate Ken Squier’s delivery, introducing each driver with at least one fact, whether it be their home state, how many Daytona wins they had, or in one case, a nickname. With Dario Franchitti joining the NASCAR circuit, my introduction to car #40 was simply “The Flying Scotsman, Dario Franchitti.” This would become the first of several nicknames that would be used in future videos:

“The Bright Yella Fella, Paul Menard!”

“Who Da Man? David Reu-da-man!”

“It’s black, it quacks, it’s sponsored by Aflac, the 99 of Concrete Carl Edwards!”

Thanks to my experience on RaceTalkRadio.com, narrating the video seemed a whole lot easier than singing a silly song or playing two different people on-air. I’d picked up a cheap video editor and a headset microphone with a rubber mic arm that slowly bent into my mouth every couple of minutes. After pulling “Las Vegas” into the editor and pulling up my script, fresh off the printer, I hit the “record” button and started my call in a low, even voice.

“Ladies and gentlemen, the starting grid as they have qualified for the 50th Daytona 500. . .”

It took a number of takes, but I was finally happy enough with the result. I then found out that editing the template took much longer than I thought, and I was up well after midnight changing the text one frame at a time, making sure the drivers, cars, and rows matched perfectly. I had a monthly calendar commemorating the 50th 500, which I took another picture of and used for the opening image. Another bold font, “Gorilla,” was used for the “Starting Grid” text. Putting the edited pictures into the editor was much easier, just lining them up with beats in the recording, using crossfades like those used in 2008. By keeping much of each screen the same and changing just one thing, the result came out better than I expected. 

In the early morning hours of February 15, 2008, the video went live on YouTube to mostly good reviews. To date, it remains far and away my most popular starting grid, though even ten years later, it still has less than 40,000 hits.

FOUR SEASONS AND A BLUNDER

At the time I posted the grid, I was out of work, and unsure of how much further these videos would take me. All I did know from previous experience was that, if something happened, it wouldn’t happen right away. With that, I decided to re-apply to law school. When I got into John F. Kennedy University in nearby Pleasant Hill, the plan was to keep doing the grid videos on the side. Whichever of the two careers took off first would be the direction I would go. I thought it was a good idea at the time. If I’d learned one thing at that time, it was that nothing was a guarantee.

The hand-drawn cover image for the 2010 Daytona 500
Starting Grid video.

And so, I continued to make Starting Grid videos each week for the Cup Series through my graduation from JFKU in 2011. As with my previous experiments, I figured out ways to improve the format one week at a time. I converted the videos to widescreen in 2009, picked up a copy of Photoshop, and began dropping in video clips. I started recording qualifying sessions, practice, and followed the sport closer than I had before. Knowing that these videos had a limited shelf life up to the start of each race, I tried to increase their re-watch value by making skits and montages. My videos for the Toyota / Save Mart 350 were played on the buses Hunt’s Race World chartered to the race. “Brock’s Starting Grid Network,” or “BSGN,” seemed to be headed the right direction.

Here were some of my favorite videos:

2008 Ford 400 at Homestead
The first season in review video, fast-forwarded to Metallica's "Fuel."

2009 Daytona 500 "Super Bowl Spot"
SpeedWeeks was always circled on my calendar. This first of three yearly hype videos for the 500 was probably my best. It was also made on the old Compaq Presario.

2009 Allstate 400 at the Brickyard
Even though the Brickyard 400 had fallen in popularity, I always enjoyed hyping the race.

2009 Chevy Rock 'n Roll 400 at Richmond
The opening boils down the clinch scenarios for various drivers, heading into the final race before the Chase.

2009 AMP Energy 500 at Talladega
I wanted to open this video with Stone Phillips' clip from "The Colbert Report" where he said "Warning: The images you're about to see - are awesome." I couldn't find it in time.

2010 Daytona 500
In a throwback to the children's book, I hand-drew the opening image and spliced in clips of putting it together.

2010 NASCAR Sprint All-Star Race
I liked to get creative with the formats I used. Here, I introduced the All-Star field in a format reminiscent of Racing Champions' old trading cards.

2010 Irwin Tools Night Race at Bristol
A solid Bristol hype video to a cover of "You Spin Me Round (Like A Record)."

2010 Ford 400 at Homestead
Harvick vs. Hamlin vs. Johnson, with a retrospective on their careers.

2011 Gatorade Duel Race #1 at Daytona
By 2011, I had expanded my SpeedWeeks coverage to both the Budweiser Shootout and both Gatorade Duels. I was also considering Nationwide and Truck grids.

2011 Daytona 500
We found these stock car shaped cookie cutters, and my mother had the idea to make the entire entry list for the Daytona 500 with frosting. 2011's became the foundation for the grid.

2011 Brickyard 400
All the commercials used in the opening were played during NASCAR broadcasts in 2011. These montages became a yearly feature, none bigger - and more obnoxious - than this one.

2011 Nationwide Series at Montreal

The only XFINITY Series race I did, including memorable moments at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve.

But the views simply weren’t there. Not only had the hits dropped to just a few thousand, no matter how much work I put into any one video, but they showed no signs of going back up. Some of this, I felt, was due to bad luck.

In 2008, 10 of the 36 races run had qualifying rained-out, including three in a row in the fall. Thus, several grids in a row differed little from one another, and I couldn’t obtain accurate car photos, undermining my effort to use them as a way to inform fans.

In 2009, I attempted a fan petition to get Regan Smith voted into the All-Star Race, months after his win at Talladega was taken away due to the “yellow-line rule.” After spreading the word and even producing a video, it was revealed that Furniture Row Racing, who he drove for at the time, wasn’t even entered in the race.

In 2010, I was hired by Frontstretch.com to follow the teams on the verge of falling out of the Top 35 in Owner Points. It was a fun job, and gave me my first chance at working trackside. The site also showed interest in posting my starting grid videos. At first, e-mailing the files to be re-posted cost more money than I was making, but I didn't mind because I was gaining experience. Unfortunately, the effort was snake-bit by a non-Frontstretch person who recommended I apply to the site in the first place. Calling himself "Alex," this person misled me into believing he was a PR agent for Larry Gunselman’s team. Eager to make connections, I believed him – until he started asking for money. When this person then started harassing my editor, I decided to leave Frontstretch at season's end.

But all this paled in comparison to what happened in 2011.

While fighting to get BSGN off the ground, I had graduated from law school and taken the California BAR Exam in late July 2011. Results were set to be posted online on Friday, November 18, two days before the season-ending Ford 400 at Homestead. That year’s Chase – and that season – had been a thrill, complete with first-time winners (including Regan Smith), wild finishes, and by November, a near dead-heat between Tony Stewart and Carl Edwards for the championship. All of it was reported on BSGN in some of the best grids I’d yet made, complete with clips from practice and qualifying. But, even then, the hits just didn’t go anywhere.

As I awaited the results from the BAR, I threw all my eggs into the Homestead basket. I produced a hype video to post earlier in the week, featuring all the action from the season. I blended together roof cam shots from every race to use in the grid’s credits. I selected clips for every driver in the field to play in the background of each row – even the teams which weren’t likely to qualify. It would also include one of my most popular running gags at the time, where I meshed clips of Christopher Nolan’s “Inception” with David Stremme’s team “Inception Motorsports." I even left a space open after the opening where I would reveal my passing the BAR, something I’d talked about on the channel earlier that summer. After all, I remember being “cautiously optimistic” after the exam. 

I still don’t like using that expression. Because, on Friday night, I learned that I failed the BAR.

When I received the news, the 2011 Ford 400 grid was already more than halfway done. I decided to finish it, though my heart wasn’t in it.

FALLING TO THE REAR

Things weren’t the same after that. I retook the BAR that spring, during which time I went cold turkey on all things NASCAR. The exam was held on three consecutive days in late February, starting on Tuesday, February 28, 2012. This, you may recall, was the time the Daytona 500 was rain delayed until Monday night. Staying at a hotel for the exam, I had to keep the television off, even when someone texted me about “did you see that fire in the race?” I didn’t watch a second of it until well after the test was over. It was the right decision.

Again, I was confident I had passed – I had nothing left when it was over. I slowly got back into my old rhythm, though without the BSGN grids. I did, however, enter a contest on SPEED Channel where fans submitted a clip introducing their favorite driver in the race. Remembering the failed Regan Smith promotion three years earlier, I decided to do a clip for Smith. To my surprise, my clip won, and to sweeten the pot, it would be played on Saturday, May 19 – one day after my BAR results came in. It was a chance to mend all fences.

But I failed again. This time, I was about as close as you can get – 1424, a handful of multiple-choice questions short of a passing 1440. The next night, SPEED played my clip. Amazingly, they very nearly didn’t. Earlier that week, the channel aired my clip as a potential nominee, and someone else posted that clip on YouTube. When I shared the clip with SPEED, they thought I’d leaked the clip and threatened to disqualify me. The misunderstanding was barely corrected in time. Needless to say, it was hard to fully enjoy that moment.

I made a third run at the BAR that fall, but my stamina was gone. I didn't realize it at the time, but it was a fight to get back there in July, and I was now dreading November. Once again, results day was the Friday before Homestead. Once again, I had failed, and this time by a bigger margin. I couldn’t do it to myself again, or to my family. I haven’t since.

It may sound silly to say I was in a depression over some test, but I was. This was so much bigger than that. This was my career - maybe not my passion, but a career I'd always figured was perfect for me as a writer. I always thought I'd be in the legal field, that NASCAR would just be some hobby. Every attorney I knew - including my father - had a hobby they escaped into, whether it be art, hunting, or watching sports. I figured I wouldn't be any different. But I was. Now, the question was - what was I?

All I knew was I just needed something – anything – to go right, if only to pull out of this funk. By January, I got tired of waiting. I decided to make something happen.

I first turned to my blog, which had only been updated sporadically during that turbulent 2012. Years earlier, “43 Stories,” the blog where I annotated race reviews in 2008, revealed one curious thing to me. In each race result, I always had something to say about two drivers: the race winner and the last-place finisher. It made me think more about why that was the case, and what drew me just as much to the back of the field as the front. It was this moment that made me re-think how best to cover NASCAR. I renamed the blog “The 43rd Story,” and focused on the last-place finisher exclusively. At my brother’s suggestion, I went with a better name – LASTCAR.

LASTCAR had received some praise those first few seasons, including a feature by NASCAR.com writer Mark Aumann that made the front page after the 2010 Daytona 500. Jayski followed the site, and started sharing my links. For the first few seasons, those articles were short as I struggled to find the right tone, and I provided very little information beyond my statistics. The readership remained small, growing slightly after I expanded from Cup coverage to Busch and Trucks in mid-2010. An attempt to expand to Formula One in late 2012 was met with no interest at all, so those features were quickly cut. Now, in 2013, there was a chance to rebuild the readership I’d lost during the last two runs at the BAR.

I started by getting into self-publishing, if only to make a couple dollars on the side. I’d been thinking about expanding the LASTCAR brand by making my own history books, this time for all audiences instead of just children. That winter, I’d completed the first two books, chronicling the last-place history of Cup, Busch, and Truck Series competition. And, slowly, the books started to sell. Another two self-published books would join the library. I then looked toward a way of promoting these books, and looked back to BSGN.

There were mixed feelings dusting off those old Photoshop files and audio equipment. It just didn’t feel right. But, the more I did it, the more I realized I needed to do it, if only to feel good about something again. By race week, I would produce two new videos – a new “hype” video, using the theme of the “Daytona USA” video game, leading to the 2013 Daytona 500 grid. The grid used a template I had planned to use for the 2012 Daytona 500 before the BAR results came. The video still wasn’t a big hit, just like all the ones before it. But this time, that didn’t matter. I was just happy that Homestead 2011 wasn’t the last one I’d ever make.

Then, that summer, came a real breakthrough. I’d made another “hype” video for the 25th annual running of the Toyota / Save Mart 350, which was coming up that June. I’d sent a copy to the track staff, who got back to me soon after. They said they enjoyed the video so much that they would play it during the pre-race on Sunday, and awarded my brother and I pit passes to the race. The video was well-received, and resulted in an internship where I helped the track promote that September’s FIA World Touring Car Championship weekend. More new friendships were made, and I now had a foothold to grow LASTCAR.

Since 2013, I have made just five more starting grids. LASTCAR, meanwhile, has expanded to multiple features with a greater emphasis on the drivers and teams themselves. The last-place finish has become a framing device to tell stories that don't often get reported. We have now covered NASCAR events under our own name at both Sonoma and Darlington. And now, this July, my book on J.D. McDuffie – the only driver to have a feature written on him at both KFNF and LASTCAR – will go on sale from Waldorf Publishing. And, most importantly, I now have a new career in the medical field, where I register patients in the emergency room of a local hospital. At least two of my co-workers have LASTCAR.info shirts.

In many ways, this journey has been a series of successful failures: while each project didn't go very far, the sum total has expanded my horizons. And that journey continues. LASTCAR.info is itself still a work in progress, just now beginning to make a name for itself. Many have asked me about my motivation for writing about last-place finishers and teams that struggle. 

To them, I can only say I’m no different.