January 27, 2009
By Allen Madding
Word out of Daytona has 54 cars planning on making an attempt to qualify for the Daytona 500, and no one should be surprised as it is traditionally the highest paying 43 finishing positions of the 36-race season.
The question on many fans and NASCAR insiders minds alike was briefly touched on by accidentally aired comments by Darrell Waltrip this week. When the Sprint Cup Series shows up for the second event on the schedule, how many cars will attempt to qualify? For years, one-race arrangements have been pulled together to run the Daytona 500 with no financial plans for making the other 35 events.
If one of the “Daytona only” cars finish in the top-10, the team may parlay the race winnings into one or two more events or be able to convince a sponsor to make a limited sponsorship agreement, but typically reality sits in by the fourth event on the schedule when the cars begin unloading.
Reviewing the “unofficial” entry list for the 2009 Daytona 500 reveals 15 teams without sponsorship.
- Jeremy Mayfield has submitted a Toyota to the NASCAR certification process in order to compete in the Daytona 500 with no number or sponsor declared to date.
- Likewise Joe Nemechek has also submitted his entry form for the Daytona 500 for his own No. 87 unsponsored Toyota.
- Derrike Cope has entered his own No. 75 unsponsored Dodge.
- Mark Simo has entered an unsponsored No. 60 Ford for Boris Said.
- Norm Benning has submitted his own unsponsored Chevrolet that will possibly bear the No. 57.
- David Bean has submitted an entry for Kelly Bires to drive an unsponsored No. 51 Dodge.
- Carl Long has entered his unsponsored No. 46 Dodge.
- Chip Ganassi has an entry submitted for an unsponsored No. 41 with the driver name space left blank.
- Tommy Baldwin has Scott Riggs lined up to drive the No. 36 Toyota with no sponsor as of yet.
- Doug Yates has the No. 28 Ford entered for Travis Kvapil without sponsorship.
- The late Dale Earnhardt’s former crew chief, Kirk Shelmerdine, submitted an entry for his unsponsored No. 27 Toyota.
- Robert Richardson has an entry for an unsponsored No. 23 Chevrolet for Mike Skinner.
- Aric Almirola is entered in the Earnhardt-Ganassi No. 8 Chevrolet with no named sponsor as of this writing.
- And finally, John Carter has entered the unsponsored No. 08 Dodge for James Hylton.
If those 15 cars do not have sponsorship packages put together by the time the green flag drops for the Great American Race, then only 39 cars are left to make the 43-car field for subsequent events. One can be pretty certain that James Hylton and Kirk Shelmerdine have no intention of running any NASCAR Sprint Cup Series events after Daytona.
Mike Skinner, Carl Long, Norm Benning, Derrike Cope, Joe Nemechek and Jeremy Mayfield will gladly make as many events as they can find funding for, but putting together single event financing in this year’s sagging economy will be significantly more difficult than in years past.
Travis Kvapil, Scott Riggs, Aric Almirola and Kelly Bires can only hope their owners can pull off a major coup and land even a limited-event sponsorship for the season. We know that once the Sprint Cup Teams leave Daytona, we will not see Boris Said again until the Series competes on the two road courses.
In addition, Bill Elliott is running a limited schedule driving the Wood Brother’s No. 21 Motorcraft Ford, which in a worse case scenario could put the field down to as low as 38 cars for some events.
NASCAR’s Mike Helton was quick to note during the annual media tour this week that there were 15 “new” teams that had submitted cars to the NASCAR Research and Development center for certification this year. The news was supposed to make it sound like the economy was not impacting the series. But, if you consider the lack of sponsorship on those 15 cars, the future seems a little bleak.
Television broadcasts should not be impacted as viewers hardly see more than the first ten cars in the field. But qualifying for a 43-car field when only 38 or 40 show up is like shooting fish in a barrel, is it not?
The thoughts and ideas expressed by this writer or any other writer on Insider Racing News, are not necessarily the views of the staff and/or management of IRN.
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