Daytona 500 Charts Own Super Course

The celebration will be huge. The paycheck will be handsome. The winner will earn a permanent place in NASCAR lore.

But make no mistake: The Daytona 500, the so-called Super Bowl of stock-car racing, isn’t anything like the real Super Bowl.

“Of course, everybody wants to win it,” says Mark Martin, who never has. “But it’s just one race. We all know that next week, we go to Rockingham [Ill], and that race counts just the same.”

The Super Bowl rewards perseverance through a grinding, physical season filled with injuries and changes. The Daytona 500 is the first race of the year, and comes when everyone is healthy and fresh.

The Super Bowl champion is the team that shows it can win under many different circumstances, depending on weather, the opponent and the situation. The Daytona 500 champion is often a specialist at restrictor-plate tracks, where only four of the season’s 36 races, including two at Daytona, are held.

After the Super Bowl, there is no next week, except for the Pro Bowl -- the NFL’s All-Star game. After the Daytona 500, there are 35 next weeks, and every one of them is an All-Star game -- there are 43 entrants for every race.

“That’s why you don’t try to force a win here,” Martin says. “You never put all your eggs in one basket.”

The winners of the Super Bowl receive the Vince Lombardi Trophy and the undisputed distinction of being recognized as the best in their sport that year. The winner of the Daytona 500 receives 175 points (not counting bonuses) in a year in which about 4,800 will win the title. He leaves knowing that only once since the restrictor-plate era began in 1988 has the winner of the Daytona 500 gone on to win the Winston Cup championship. That was Jeff Gordon in 1997.

Last year’s series champion, Tony Stewart, finished last at Daytona. Last year’s Daytona winner, Ward Burton, finished 25th in the series standings.

“Last year was our best year and our worst year all rolled into one,” said Bill Davis, the owner of Burton’s car.

Davis said winning Daytona was the best part of the year. Indeed, a victory in NASCAR’s most famous race is hardly meaningless.

“It’s the granddaddy of them all,” Joe Nemecheck said. “I mean, just look at all the time and heartache Dale Earnhardt spent trying to win this thing.”

Indeed, it took 23 years for The Intimidator to break through, and when he did in 1998, he filled in the final missing piece to an unparalleled career that included 76 victories.

Earnhardt died at the track three years later -- a tragic loss for the sport that, strangely, brought it even more into the spotlight than before.

Fox Sports estimates more than 30 million Americans will watch the “Great American Race” today, compared to about 137 million for the Super Bowl. Just like the Super Bowl, many who watch Daytona are big-time fans of the sport, while others will tune in only for the big event.

Those who watch today are likely to see Dale Earnhardt Jr., and Michael Waltrip make a good run for the title.