Dale Earnhardt Jr. wins Daytona 500

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DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – In a battle of weather vs. patience, NASCAR’s most popular driver, Dale Earnhardt Jr., endured a six-hour, 22-minute rain delay that included two tornado warnings to win the 56th Daytona 500 Sunday night at Daytona International Speedway.

In winning his second Great American Race (first time was in 2004), Earnhardt held on in the 200-lap green-white-checker finish to beat Denny Hamlin to the checkered flag. Earnhardt’s winning speed was 195.109 mph.

Nothing could stop Earnhardt, not even what appeared to be a trash bag wedged into his front grill.

“Man winning this race is the greatest feeling that you can feel in this sport, aside of accepting the trophy for the championship,” Earnhardt Jr. said. “It feels as good if not better than the first. Especially running second after all the years.”

“Congrats to Junior, the world is right, Dale Jr. just won the Daytona 500. That’s a sign the 2014 season is going to be a good one,” fourth-place finisher and Hendrick Motorsports teammate Jeff Gordon said.

Brad Keselowski finished third, just behind Gordon at the time of a caution right at the finish for a multi-car accident.

Jimmie Johnson was fifth, with Ricky Stenhouse Jr., Matt Kenseth, Greg Biffle, polesitter Austin Dillon, and Casey Mears rounding out the unofficial top 10.

The race was marred by two big multi-car wrecks. The first one, a 12-car wreck, occurred on Lap 146, with Danica Patrick being spun and ran head-on into an unprotected retaining wall at nearly 200 mph.

Patrick was an innocent victim in the 12-car wreck, which occurred coming out of Turn 4. The wreck appeared to begin when Brian Scott went up the track into the car of Aric Almirola, who hit the wall and spun down towards the infield, collecting several cars in the process.

Patrick was in the wrong place at the wrong time and plowed straight into a part of the retaining wall that is not protected by a SAFER barrier.

When asked by crew chief Tony Gibson whether she was okay, Patrick, whose voice appeared shaky on the team radio, responded, “Yeah what the hell happened?”

Later, interviewed by Fox Sports, Patrick added, “I thought everything was going pretty well. … It’s a bummer but that’s kind of the excitement of speedway racing that anything can happen and it’s unfortunate that I was at the short end of it all.”

Drivers besides Patrick, Almirola and Scott that were involved in the wreck included Kevin Harvick, Parker Kligerman, Paul Menard, Michael Waltrip, Reed Sorenson, polesitter Austin Dillon, Kasey Kahne, Marcos Ambrose, Justin Allgaier and Josh Wise.

Sixteen laps later and in virtually the same spot as the earlier wreck, with two high-profile Sprint Cup rookies battling for the same real estate on the racetrack, Daytona 500 pole-sitter Austin Dillon spun Kyle Larson, triggering yet another big wreck involving 10 cars.

Dillon, who may have had a tire going down, appeared to get into the rear of Larson, with the cars of Kasey Kahne, Michael Annett, Marcos Ambrose, Brian Vickers, Casey Mears, Jamie McMurray, Ryan Newman and Brian Scott all being caught up in the resulting carnage.

“I don’t know if Austin got loose and shuffled up the track and got into me and turned us,” Larson said. “It’s Daytona, it sucks to end it like this.”

Trevor Bayne, winner of the 2011 Daytona 500, was involved in a one-car wreck with 16 laps remaining. Kurt Busch then took a solo spin with 10 laps left, but was able to continue on to pit road without a caution flag falling.

Just when it appeared wrecking was over for the night, Dillon triggered yet another wreck, running into the rear of his Richard Childress Racing teammate, Ryan Newman, ending with seven cars being involved.

Other drivers in the wreck were Terry Labonte, making his 33rd and final Daytona 500 start of his career, along with Allgaier, Scott, Cole Whitt and Parker Kligerman.

But the crashing still wasn’t done as yet another multi-car wreck occurred on the last lap.

Among drivers involved were Sorenson and Carl Edwards.

Three drivers who were among those considered to be potential winners had their nights end not the way they wanted, two due to blown engines, and one other for a different type of mechanical failure.

Martin Truex Jr. lost the motor in his Furniture Row Racing Chevrolet on Lap 31, seven laps before the race was red-flagged for rain.

Clint Bowyer then lost his engine on Lap 126.

“If it was going to blow up, I wish it would have blown up four hours ago,” an obviously dejected Bowyer said.

Tony Stewart took his Stewart-Haas Racing Chevrolet to the garage on Lap 135 with fuel pressure problems.

Stewart was able to get back on the track, but finished a dismal 35th in his first Sprint Cup race back since he suffered a severely broken leg in a sprint car crash early last August that resulted in him missing the final 15 Cup races of the season.

Stewart was looking to break a jinx similar to that of the late Dale Earnhardt, who didn’t win his first Daytona 500 until his 20th try. Stewart is now winless in the sport’s biggest race in 16 tries.

The fastest lap of the race was by Dillon, who put down a turn around the 2.5-mile high banks of DIS at 204.3 mph.

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Texas starting lineup: Felix Rosenqvist back on pole; Scott Dixon qualifies second

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FORT WORTH, Texas — For the second consecutive year, Felix Rosenqvist will lead the NTT IndyCar Series starting lineup to the green flag at Texas Motor Speedway.

The Arrow McLaren driver is hoping the third time will be the charm at the 1.5-mile oval, where he has run extremely well but has only a career-best 12th in five starts.

“We’ve always been good here, but this is a whole different confidence level compared to last year,” Rosenqvist told NBC Sports’ Marty Snider. “Let’s try to wrap it up (Sunday).”

In 2020, Rosenqvist was competing for a podium when he crashed with 10 laps remaining at Texas.

QUALIFYING RESULTS: Click here for speeds from Saturday’s time trials

INDYCAR AT TEXASSchedule, start times, how to watch on NBC, Peacock

Last year, he started first on an oval for the first time in his career but finished 21st because of a broken halfshaft.

“It’s definitely one of my favorite tracks, and naturally, I’ve always been OK here,” Rosenqvist said. “It was the first oval that made sense to me. Every year I’m building on that. But looking at the results, they don’t represent the speed I normally have.

“I don’t want to jinx anything, but I hope tomorrow is going to go a bit better and some luck our way would be nice. It’s been feeling super good. Arrow McLaren has been mega every session, so just keep it rolling.”

Arrow McLaren qualified all three of its Chevrolets in the top five, building on a second for Pato O’Ward and fourth for Alexander Rossi in the Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg.

The March 5 season opener was a disappointing start for Rosenqvist who was squeezed into the wall by Scott Dixon on the first lap.

Dixon, a five-time winner at Texas, will start second Sunday, followed by Rossi and Josef Newgarden. O’Ward will start fifth alongside Takuma Sato, who will start on the outside of the third row in his Chip Ganassi Racing debut.

During nearly four hours of practice and qualifying (including a special high-line session), Saturday’s lone incident involved Conor Daly.

The Ed Carpenter Racing driver spun three times but stayed off the wall and in the frontstretch grass. Aside from a front wing change and new tires, there was no damage to his No. 20 Dallara-Chevrolet during the incident midway through the 30-minute session in which drivers were limited to the high line.

“I hadn’t really had a moment before, but it snapped really aggressively,” Daly told NBC Sports after final practice. “Not ideal, but I do know my way around correcting a spin it seems like. I drove NASCAR last weekend and that seemed to help a little bit. I drove in the dirt a lot in USAC Midgets and seemed to be able to save something but not ideal or what we wanted to have happen.”

Daly will start 25th of 28 cars alongside teammate Rinus VeeKay in Row 13. Carpenter qualified 18th.

“Our three of our cars were clearly looking for something. Mechanical grip is for sure what we need. Qualifying we actually expected to be a lot better, but we found an issue there. We’ll see what happens. This race can change a lot. I’m confident in the team to hopefully figure some things out for tomorrow.”

Here’s the IndyCar starting lineup for Sunday’s PPG 375 at Texas Motor Speedway (qualifying position, car number in parentheses, driver, engine and speed):


ROW 1

1. (6) Felix Rosenqvist, Dallara-Chevy, 220.264 mph
2. (9) Scott Dixon, Dallara-Honda, 219.972

ROW 2

3. (7) Alexander Rossi, Dallara-Chevy, 219.960
4. (2) Josef Newgarden, Dallara-Chevy, 219.801

ROW 3

5. (5) Pato O’Ward, Dallara-Chevy, 219.619
6. (11) Takuma Sato, Dallara-Honda, 219.508

ROW 4

7. (10) Alex Palou, Dallara-Honda, 219.480
8. (12) Will Power, Dallara-Chevy, 219.355

ROW 5

9. (18) David Malukas, Dallara-Honda, 219.256
10. (26) Colton Herta, Dallara-Honda, 219.184

ROW 6

11. (28) Romain Grosjean, Dallara-Honda, 219.165
12. (29) Devlin DeFrancesco, Dallara-Honda, 219.146

ROW 7 

13. (55) Benjamin Pedersen, Dallara-Chevy, 219.100
14. (14) Santino Ferrucci, Dallara-Chevy, 218.892

ROW 8

15. (3) Scott McLaughlin, Dallara-Chevy, 218.765
16. (8) Marcus Ericsson, Dallara-Honda, 218.698

ROW 9

17. (77) Callum Ilott, Dallara-Chevy, 218.427
18. (33) Ed Carpenter, Dallara-Chevy, 218.375

ROW 10

19. (78) Agustin Canapino, Dallara-Chevy, 218.367
20. (27) Kyle Kirkwood, Dallara-Honda, 218.227

ROW 11

21. (06) Helio Castroneves, Dallara-Honda, 218.196
22. (60) Simon Pagenaud, Dallara-Honda, 218.103

ROW 12

23. (51) Sting Ray Robb, Dallara-Honda, 217.676
24. (15) Graham Rahal, Dallara-Honda, 217.611

ROW 13

25. (20) Conor Daly, Dallara-Chevy, 217.457
26. (21) Rinus VeeKay, Dallara-Chevy, 216.880

ROW 14

27. (45) Christian Lundgaard, Dallara-Honda, 216.210
28. (30) Jack Harvey, Dallara-Honda, 216.103