Driver Of The Week: Daytona

Last season, at the beginning of each race, I took notice of those drivers who did and did not show respect to our nation's flag during the National Anthem. This season, I am doing things a bit different. I am not going to be pointing out those drivers who chose not to show respect to our flag, but I will do a weekly post about the race, and highlight those drivers who do show respect to our flag.

This week's driver of the week? Jeff Burton.

Of course, there could have been other drivers showing respect, but the television cameras did not catch them.

As far as the Daytona 500. Wow. What a race. A lot of good drivers, including a couple of my favorites, were caught up in wrecks and such, which provided for one of the most exciting finishes in a long time.

It came down to the wire with Mark Martin and Kevin Harvick. Kevin Harvick won by 2 one-hundredths of a second. NASCAR failed to follow it's own rules though.

"We get criticized for everything we do, and this is no exception," competition director Robin Pemberton said Monday. "If we throw the flag too early, people are mad that we kept Harvick from winning. If we throw it too late, people are mad that Mark Martin didn't win.

"It's hard. It's always hard. All we can do is make the best decisions that we can in that moment."

But in that moment NASCAR slightly changed its own rules.

In the old days, drivers raced to the flag when the caution came out. That practice was stopped in 2003, when NASCAR determined it was too dangerous to allow speeding cars to zip past an accident scene.

Now, the field is frozen and all cars must slow down when a caution comes out. Multi-car mayhem generally warrants a caution. But as Kyle Busch, Matt Kenseth and Jeff Gordon bumped and banged across the track just a few hundred yards from the finish, NASCAR let the racing go on.

It wasn't until Clint Bowyer flipped, crossing the finish line on his roof as flames ripped through his car, that NASCAR finally waved the yellow flag.

People scream about NASCAR's consistency everyday. This is just another example that they are not consistent. Ever. Each decision is unique, and each call is controversial for someone, but the one thing NASCAR should never compromise on is safety. I have seen many a race where NASCAR calls the caution because of debris on the track, even when they know the debris is nothing but foam that a driver has probably thrown onto the track. I've even seen them call a caution when a car on the opposite side of the track is slowing down and pulling into the garage, and there is no chance any of the cars on the track will come close to it before it pulls off. All of these calls are made in the interest of driver safety. What happened at Daytona?

Sure, the drivers who were in front of the wreck, racing to win, were safe from flying debris and flipping cars, but what about the majority of drivers coming up on the wreck? As the wreck began cars began to spin out and there was no caution. When there is no caution, drivers go as fast as they can. Those drivers in the rear of the field, looking for the best possible finish in the race, were going as fast as they could and ended up wrecking into those in front of them. The only reason Clint Bowyer ended up on his roof sliding across the finish line is because NASCAR did not call the caution and wave the flag, which would have slowed everyone down and would have been the right thing to do.

I congratulate Kevin Harvick and Mark Martin both, for a damn good ending to a damn good race. I do, however, still think NASCAR screwed up by not waving the yellow flag when the first two cars began to spin out.