Old school is now new school at Daytona

February 17, 2013 Greg Engle Main Page, NASCAR News Top Story, Top Stories 0

DAYTONA BEACH, FL - FEBRUARY 16: Kurt Busch, driver of the #78 Furniture Row Racing Chevrolet, Denny Hamlin, driver of the #11 FedEx Express Toyota, Jimmie Johnson, driver of the #48 Lowe's Yellow Chevrolet, Kyle Busch, driver of the #18 M&M's Toyota, Jeff Gordon, driver of the #24 Drive To End Hunger Chevrolet, and Carl Edwards, driver of the #99 Fastenal Ford, are involved in an incident during the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Sprint Unlimited at Daytona International Speedway on February 16, 2013 in Daytona Beach, Florida. (Photo by Nick Laham/Getty Images)
DAYTONA BEACH, FL - FEBRUARY 16: Kurt Busch, driver of the #78 Furniture Row Racing Chevrolet, Denny Hamlin, driver of the #11 FedEx Express Toyota, Jimmie Johnson, driver of the #48 Lowe's Yellow Chevrolet, Kyle Busch, driver of the #18 M&M's Toyota, Jeff Gordon, driver of the #24 Drive To End Hunger Chevrolet, and Carl Edwards, driver of the #99 Fastenal Ford, are involved in an incident during the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Sprint Unlimited at Daytona International Speedway on February 16, 2013 in Daytona Beach, Florida. (Photo by Nick Laham/Getty Images)
DAYTONA BEACH, FL – FEBRUARY 16: Kurt Busch, driver of the #78 Furniture Row Racing Chevrolet, Denny Hamlin, driver of the #11 FedEx Express Toyota, Jimmie Johnson, driver of the #48 Lowe’s Yellow Chevrolet, Kyle Busch, driver of the #18 M&M’s Toyota, Jeff Gordon, driver of the #24 Drive To End Hunger Chevrolet, and Carl Edwards, driver of the #99 Fastenal Ford, are involved in an incident during the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Sprint Unlimited at Daytona International Speedway on February 16, 2013 in Daytona Beach, Florida. (Photo by Nick Laham/Getty Images)

DAYTONA BEACH Fla – One of the biggest lessons the NASCAR Sprint Cup drivers could take away from Saturday nights Sprint Unlimited non-points race at Daytona International Speedway was that the old school style of racing may be back at Daytona.

Saturday night’s race marked the competitive debut of NASCAR’s new Generation 6 racecar. Early in the event it looked like that debut would not be a good one. In past testing sessions when drivers tried to race together disaster ensued. The latest came Friday night during final practice for the Sprint Unlimited when a multi-car crash forced several teams to back up cars. On lap 14 Saturday night a multi-car crash erupted when Tony Stewart brought his Chevy down in front of the Ford of Marcos Ambrose and tapped the front of the car forcing both to slow. The field was forced to check up behind them setting off a crash that took out a total of seven cars.

As the race went on the field strung out into a single file line reminiscent of racing seen at Daytona years ago; long before the two car tandems NASCAR worked so hard to break up. Drivers agreed that the new cars seem to race much like those that raced in 2004 and 2005.MORE>>>

Greg Engle
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About Greg Engle 7421 Articles
Greg is a published award winning sportswriter who spent 23 years combined active and active reserve military service, much of that in and around the Special Operations community. Greg is the author of "The Nuts and Bolts of NASCAR: The Definitive Viewers' Guide to Big-Time Stock Car Auto Racing" and has been published in major publications across the country including the Los Angeles Times, the Cleveland Plain Dealer and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. He was also a contributor to Chicken Soup for the NASCAR Soul, published in 2010, and the Christmas edition in 2016. He wrote as the NASCAR, Formula 1, Auto Reviews and National Veterans Affairs Examiner for Examiner.com and has appeared on Fox News. He holds a BS degree in communications, a Masters degree in psychology and is currently a PhD candidate majoring in psychology. He is currently the weekend Motorsports Editor for Autoweek.