By Jen Dunnaway

Editor

While at Daytona for the NASCAR race weekend, I got a bit of a break in the middle of the day Saturday to sit in the almost-deserted stands with a couple of the Dodge boys and snap a few pics of the Rolex cars running their 250-mile race, which ran on Daytona’s inner road course as well as its high-banked tri-oval. A lot of race fans are still baffled that Chevrolet declined to build a NASCAR Camaro, letting the new Challenger and Mustang race cars handily steal the spotlight. Though the NASCAR version would necessarily have a more templatized body and air dam, this Rolex Series car gives a sense of what a Nationwide Series Camaro should have looked like running the superspeedway this weekend.  Hit the jump for a few more pics from of the Rolex Series race from behind Daytona’s burly catch fence.

Continue reading "Grand-Am Rolex Cars At Daytona" »

By Jen Dunnaway

Editor

I spent the entirety of Saturday’s Coke Zero 400 in Kurt Busch’s pit stall. Dodge brand president and my old One Lap buddy Ralph Gilles was there, as was the director of Dodge Motorsports, both glued to the race along with the rest of the team. Everyone was super-accommodating about letting me get right up to the pit wall with my camera, and though I usually like to scurry all over to a variety of track vantage points during a race, this was such a primo spot that I couldn’t stand to leave. Not even for a minute. Read more…

Continue reading "In The No. 2 Pit At Daytona" »

By Jen Dunnaway

Editor

This is what it looked like from the No. 2 pit box when Mark Martin drove down the pit lane in flames following the big wreck during Saturday’s Sprint Cup race in Daytona. When you’re this close to the action, it’s hard to see what all’s going on further down the line, and the TNT television broadcast was too caught up with replaying The Big One to give much live coverage of Martin’s fire. So when the MRN radio announcer said moments later with horror in his voice that Martin’s car was “completely engulfed,” I had that heart-in-my-throat feeling right up until I heard Martin, having being dragged from the smoldering hulk by members of Jimmie Johnson’s pit crew, saying in the post-wreck interview that “it looked a lot worse than it was.” Having witnessed a nasty disfiguring pit fire once before, those words were beyond music to my ears. One more of my pics below the jump, and click here for a much better one captured by Mark Rebilas.

Continue reading "Mark Martin’s 4th of July Fireball" »

By Jen Dunnaway

Editor

Dale Earnhardt Jr.’s Nationwide Series win on Friday was one of those fairytale moments that doesn’t come twice. I was watching from the pit lane as that ghostly No. 3 Wrangler car, one of Earnhardt Sr.’s most recognizable old paint schemes, sailed across Daytona’s start/finish line under the lights, and though I was far from the grandstands, the wild roar of the crowd and and that rapid-fire sparkle of hundreds of popping camera flashes hinted at the catharsis that was unfolding there. This win was a long time coming, and on the hallowed grounds of Daytona that will forever link father and son in both motorsports history and American folk memory, the closing of this particular chapter of the Earnhardt story could not have been more perfect. Read more…

Continue reading "Junior: “If We Didn’t Win, What A Waste of Time”" »

By Jen Dunnaway

Editor

I never in a million years anticipated that witnessing the new Nationwide cars on the track in person for the first time would be what they call a “religious experience,” but I got chills watching the new Mustangs and Challengers roar around the high banks of Daytona during qualifying today. The advent of these cars in NASCAR feels historic in a somehow visceral way that I can’t completely explain. More to the point, it feels right. These lean, well-differentiated cars have been what NASCAR has needed for a long time now.

But will they even get to race? It’s raining in Daytona at time of writing, though they’re saying it’s going to dry out in time for tonight’s race. Sprint Cup qualifying was canceled due to the weather, while the earlier Nationwide quals yielded the pole to Brad Keselowski, with another Dodge, the No. 26 of Parker Kilgerman, in the second spot. Dale Earnhardt Jr. will start from 3rd in his one-time No. 3 Chevy, with fourth place going to Justin Allgaier. By all estimates, it’s going to be an interesting race for the largely unproven New Car, Junior is looking to be a factor, and those Challengers are mad fast and badass. If it gets to happen, I don’t see how it could not be the most awesome NASCAR race in recent memory. Hit the jump for a few more pics from qualifying, and tune in at 7:30 Eastern tonight on ESPN to see how it all shakes out!

Continue reading "Mustang vs. Challenger at Daytona Tonight: Will It Happen?" »

By Jen Dunnaway

Editor

For this Friday night’s Nationwide race at Daytona, Dale Earnhardt Jr. will fire up a Wrangler-branded No. 3 Chevrolet–the same number and livery as the car his late father raced here so many times. By all accounts, it’s only going to be a one-time thing, set to coincide with the Natiowide New Car’s debut for this weekend’s race–as Junior very memorably quipped to ESPN earlier this week, “You just don’t grab the car keys off the counter and go run out the door and haul down the road with your dad’s car. I didn’t do it when he was alive, and I won’t do it now.” That’s our Junebug. The all-new race car got a chance for some much-needed practice today at Daytona, and I’m on my way there tomorrow to party with Dodge. Check more pics of the race-ready Nationwide rides below the jump!

Continue reading "Dale Jr. To Race The No. 3 Car At Daytona" »

By Jen Dunnaway

Editor

For the first time ever, the Mustang and Challenger will be competing against each other on the track in NASCAR racing as the Nationwide Series “New Car” makes its debut on July 2nd. Everything on the car is different from its predecessor, and it differentiates itself from the Sprint Cup car with the much stronger brand identity built into the car’s design–Challenger and Mustang being only the most striking examples. For its entry, Chevrolet decided to go with a slightly sexier version of its Impala rather than a NASCAR Camaro; and Toyota’s just running the Camry. No one is 100% sure how this entirely new machine is going to behave on the steep banks of Daytona under competition conditions–obviously it’s gone through a lot of testing, but even top drivers are wishing they’d gotten more seat time. Justin Allgaier says this newness may help reset the playing field a bit, with raw talent taking precedence over driver experience. This should shake things up some in a series that tends to see the same top drivers, most of them also Sprint-Cup regulars, running pretty predictably up front. Watch the Nationwide new car hit the track on Friday at 7:30 pm Eastern on ESPN, then catch the Sprint Cup night race on Saturday at 7:30 on TNT.

By Jen Dunnaway

Editor

During the race this weekend, I ran across a small collection of what looked like battle-scarred moonshine-runners on display in the infield. But wait–these cars belong to the members of vintage racing association NorCal Vintage Hartops, and are built for real competition with a distinctly Californian style. Stock car racing on the West Coast co-evolved alongside the Southern branch of the sport, but came out of a different set of historical circumstances–it was a culture built by returning WWII veterans eager for race cars to tinker on, and overlapped a great deal with the California hot rod scene. In any case, Conrad Cavallero, who was manning the display at Infineon, is dedicated to keeping that history alive–and the cars on the track. The examples he had on hand were mostly running sbc’s, some punched out to 358, though one was powered by a Ford straight six. There were even a couple of later-model tribute cars and a random antique tractor or two in the mix. Hit the jump to see more!

NASCAR coverage brought to you by Valvoline Engine Guarantee–the first and only motor oil in the industry that will guarantee your engine up to 300,000 miles. *Registration required, some limitations apply.

Continue reading "Still Racing: Vintage Stock Cars at Infineon" »

By Jen Dunnaway

Editor

Let me qualify that: ever had this happen while on a road course in traffic? Denny Hamlin managed to navigate roughly half of Infineon’s winding track totally blind–a pretty marvelous feat–after his hood flew up following some unresolved sheetmetal damage from early in the race. He didn’t lose much time in the pits because during the ensuing stop–his crew was apparently pretty handy with the bolt cutters, and the next time he came around where I was shooting, he was running with no hood. But Denny’s dismal day was only going to get worse–they had to strip off his entire front clip after he was caught up in the big wreck later on, and for the remainder he battled in the rear with the other fenderless cars.

Going through my Infineon pics, I found that I had the gradual deconstruction of the No. 11 car entirely documented on my camera from different points on the track–and the way it went, it kind of reminded me of that animated gif of the little typing guy who smashes his own head to pieces. It’s really too bad for the No. 11 team, which has been on a streak lately and who showed a lot of promise coming into this race. And they clearly demonstrated a lot of grit for sticking it out to the end.

NASCAR coverage brought to you by Valvoline Engine Guarantee–the first and only motor oil in the industry that will guarantee your engine up to 300,000 miles. *Registration required, some limitations apply.

Continue reading "Ever Had This Happen?" »

By Jen Dunnaway

Editor

My weekend at Infineon was packed full of sunshine and racing, with the competitors ranging from regular-Joe locals to world-class Sprint Cup teams. What an awesome road course this place is, and how paradigm shifting to watch stock cars wallow their way around it! In our Events section, you can browse hundreds of images from Sunday’s NASCAR Sprint Cup Toyota/SaveMart 350 here. If the regional division is what you’re following, pics from the K&N Pro Series Thunder Valley Casino 200 can be browsed here. Finally, for some local color, check out pics from Saturday’s tiny but furious Legends race. And don’t miss my collected blog coverage from the entire race weekend.

NASCAR coverage brought to you by Valvoline Engine Guarantee–the first and only motor oil in the industry that will guarantee your engine up to 300,000 miles. *Registration required, some limitations apply.