Hamlin seeks historic third straight Daytona 500 victory
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — Denny Hamlin, considered perhaps the best NASCAR driver without a Cup Series championship, can look past that hole on his record. He instead points to a pair of Southern 500 trophies, a Bristol night race victory, three road course wins, six at Pocono and the big daddy of them all, the Daytona 500.
Hamlin has won NASCAR’s crown jewel, the one race that can define a driver’s career, three different times and the past two years. Today, he will attempt to become the first to win three consecutive Daytona 500s, a feat that would forever dull the disappointment of his championship failures.
“This is something that no one’s ever done before,” said Hamlin, who grew up in Chesterfield. “Other guys have won championships, obviously. I would want to do something no one else has done.”
Hamlin is the 8-1 betting favorite, but the Daytona 500 can be a crapshoot, particularly in NASCAR’s condensed new schedule forced by the pandemic. Speedweeks at Daytona International Speedway for decades spanned nearly two weeks but this year was cut to just six days.
With only three practice sessions and the 150-mile Duel qualifying races, there is no clear indication who has cars capable of winning the Daytona 500.
Hendrick Motorsports swept the front row in qualifying with Alex Bowman and William Byron, but Byron crashed in the qualifying race and will fall to the back in a backup car at the start of the 500. Bowman had an engine problem that will cost him the pole if the motor needs to be replaced.
Chase Elliott is the reigning series champion, but hasn’t had enough time to show if he’s a contender for his first Daytona 500 victory. It’s also unclear how Kyle Larson, new to the Hendrick stable this season after last year’s NASCAR suspension for using a racial slur, is adapting to his new team.
Kevin Harvick is looking to rebound after falling short of the series title in last year’s ninewin season. He tweeted “She’s bad fast” about his Ford, though it was Stewart-Haas Racing teammate Aric Almirola who won the first qualifying race and said his car is strong for Sunday.
Fellow Ford drivers and Team Penske teammates Joey Logano and Ryan Blaney both seemed able to run with Almirola.
Austin Dillon won the second duel, setting him up for a possible second Daytona 500 victory on the 20th anniversary of Dale Earnhardt’s death. Dillon drives Earnhardt’s famed No. 3 on grandfather Richard Childress’ team and understands how emotional a victory would be in that Chevrolet.
“It would be amazing and huge for the company, RCR and all the 3 fans out there,” Dillon said.
Dillon beat Bubba Wallace to win his qualifying race in a dramatic finish that showed Wallace might finally have the equipment he needs to be competitive. Wallace is the only Black racer at NASCAR’s top level and gained a national platform last season for his outspokenness on social justice issues.
He landed multiple sponsors through his activism and Wallace brought that funding to Michael Jordan and Hamlin for the launch of 23XI Racing. Jordan and Wallace are the only Black majority owner and driver combination in the sport, and this team has the sponsorship and support that could finally give Wallace a chance at his first Cup Series victory.
Rhodes picks up first Daytona win
Ben Rhodes raced to his first career victory at Daytona International Speedway with a last-corner pass Friday night in the NASCAR Truck Series opener.
Rhodes was tailing Cory Roper when he slowed to hook up with teammate Matt Crafton for a push. Crafton threw a block and darted to the top, creating momentum that helped Rhodes pull even with Roper.
After Tuesday afternoon’s run-and-gun loss to Notre Dame, Duke’s only shot at keeping a 24-year NCAA tournament streak alive is to run the table in the ACC tournament. A year after the Blue Devils unilaterally shut down the tournament in Greensboro, Duke may be one of very few teams that has good reason to go back.
The ACC is determined to play the tournament, already transferred from Washington to Greensboro in hopes of simplifying any COVID-19 logistics, but it’s worth considering whether it might be better for almost everyone involved to stay home this year. The teams with NCAA tournament bids would get more time to prepare (and quarantine!) while most of the teams hoping to get hot and win four or five in a row would inevitably be headed home after a game or two anyway.
So, is playing the tournament really necessary? To the ACC, the answer is a resounding yes, because as television inventory, those 14 games are invaluable, whether there are fans in the building or not. Even if you’re not running a network, there are good reasons to proceed. Part of the mission this season has been to give players as close to an authentic ACC experience as possible. The tournament is a huge part of that.
There’s also the chance that a Duke or a Notre Dame or a Pittsburgh could get hot and win it.
“Decisions related to conference policies and procedures are made by the league’s membership,” an ACC spokesperson said in a prepared statement. “Our schools are committed to playing the ACC men’s and women’s basketball tournaments. Our league will continue to follow all state and local guidelines and those outlined by our 15 institutions as part of the ACC’s Medical Advisory Group report.”
But when weighed against everything else, especially if maximizing the ACC’s chances in the NCAA tournament is a consideration, it’s hard to see the rewards outweighing the risk. In the ACC particularly, that’s an unpleasant conclusion to reach.
This is the original conference tournament, the one that helped make the ACC great, the template for all the others. Whether at Reynolds Coliseum or the Greensboro Coliseum or, later, at the far-flung reaches of the footprint, it brings the ACC together for a basketball festival that for a time was truly unlike any other and still stands above the rest.
Its original value — to determine the conference’s rightful (and, for a long time, sole) representative in the NCAA tournament while bringing together all eight or nine fan bases for an entire wild weekend, like an ACC convention — was long ago made moot. It lives on as a living testament to ACC tradition. Even without Saturday night free for socializing. Even in Brooklyn.
But 11 months after last year’s edition was cut short before the quarterfinals by Duke president Vincent Price as COVID-19 closed in, it’s fair to ask whether whatever residual value it still has is worth the potential cost in this bizarre season, especially in a year that few if any fans will be able to attend. Whatever decadeslong attendance streaks weren’t broken last year will fall now.
There has been enough interruption — more than a quarter of the ACC schedule has been postponed or rescheduled — to ask whether gathering every team in the ACC and potentially a bunch of parents and maybe even a few deep-pocketed boosters at a common location is worth the potential disruption. In a year when everyone’s just trying to make it to the finish line — some teams with more success than others — are these extra games really necessary? Or merely a necessary evil?
All it would take is one leak in the bubble to potentially sink the national championship hopes of ... OK, that’s not as much of a consideration this year.
It still might be better for everyone’s sake to take this one off, let the five or six or seven NCAA qualifiers get ready in seclusion for the big tournament in Indianapolis, and give the teams that have earned a bid over the course of this difficult regular season the best chance to compete.
Instead, the show will almost certainly go on, in a vacant building, hoping for the best.