Memory of the Big Daytona Crash Doesn’t Deter Stewart

Tony Stewart worried? Nah.

Despite the wild, 19-car crash in the season-opening Daytona 500, Stewart isn’t concerned about a possible repeat Sunday at Talladega.

“It’s just another race to me,” Stewart said. “As far as my accident is concerned . . . it was a racing accident. It’s over with and I’m fine.”

Stewart went airborne and landed on Bobby Labonte’s roof before barrel-rolling to a stop midway down the backstretch at Daytona International Speedway.

Stewart, the top Winston Cup rookie in 1999 and last year’s leading race winner with six, doesn’t worry because he knows his Joe Gibbs Racing Pontiac is safe.

“If anything, walking away from a crash like that gives me more confidence to get back into the car knowing it’s as safe as any engineer has ever seen for a Winston Cup car,” he said.

“We had engineers who specialize in analyzing those types of crashes come to the race shop after Daytona to look at our car and they said it was the best car they had seen, preparation-wise as far as safety was concerned.”

Dale Earnhardt was killed on the final turn of the Daytona race in a crash that looked far less dangerous than the earlier one. The death of his friend and competitor bothers Stewart far more than the possibility of being involved in another wreck.

“There’s still a part of it that’s going to be hard to deal with at Talladega,” Stewart said. “But I think that he’d want us to go on and do the best that we all can, and that’s what we’ll do.”

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REMEMBERING: The No. 28 Ford is back home this week, racing at Talladega Superspeedway, where many of the fans still think of the car as Davey Allison’s.

Allison, an integral part of the Alabama Gang--led by his father, Bobby Allison--was killed in 1993 in the crash of a helicopter at the Talladega track.

Since then, the No. 28 has been driven by Ernie Irvan, Dale Jarrett, Kenny Irwin Jr. and now Ricky Rudd. But, for many fans, the car will always be synonymous with the younger Allison, who was a budding star in NASCAR.

“For many years now, when the 28 car goes out to qualify [at Talladega], or when they announce it, it probably gets the loudest cheer of any car,” said Robert Yates, who bought the team and the car from Harry Ranier in 1989.

“The fans still remember when Davey won at Talladega back in ’89 with the 28 car. That was our first win . . . and they’ve been supporting us ever since.”

The car has not reached the winner’s circle since Irvan drove it there in 1997, but it came close two weeks ago in Martinsville, when teammate Jarrett--driving the No. 88 Taurus--passed Rudd with five laps to go and led a Yates 1-2 finish.

“Maybe the 28 wasn’t supposed to win at Martinsville because they were saving it up for Talladega, where most of the fans will be cheering for us,” Yates said.

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AERODYNAMIC EDGE: At Daytona, most drivers agree the key to winning or finishing well is handling. At Talladega--a wider, higher-banked track--aerodynamics makes the difference.

“From the front end of your car to the rear end of the car 20 cars behind you, it all comes down to that,” Jeremy Mayfield said. “You have to cut through the air here.”

The cars often run three- and four-wide at Talladega, so even a little fender rubbing can cause a big crash or simply knock a driver out of contention.

“Once you get somebody damage, you’re done,” Mayfield said. “Holding onto the draft is the first step in the race, and you just can’t do it if you have any kind of body damage.”

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EVENING UP: Chevrolets dominated the Daytona 500, with Michael Waltrip winning and Dale Earnhardt Jr. second in a pair of Monte Carlos. But Doug Duchardt, NASCAR group manager for General Motors Racing, expects things to even up Sunday in Talladega.

“We never really saw who all had strong cars in Daytona because some top cars ran a strategy of not racing hard until the last 30 laps or so, and then many of those cars were involved in the big wreck on the backstretch,” Duchardt said. “For instance, we never saw how good Dale Jarrett’s car (a Ford) really was.

“I think we’ll see some of the same strategies this weekend. We’ll see some of the top cars laying back and not messing around with the lead draft until they think it is time to go.”

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STAT OF THE WEEK: Chevrolets won the first four races of the season and Fords have won the last four. The best finish by Pontiac and the new Dodges has been second. Bobby Labonte, the defending Winston Cup champion, drove his Grand Prix to second place in Rockingham, while John Andretti’s Intrepid was the runner-up in Bristol.