Dale Jarrett blasted back from the past Sunday. And Jimmie Johnson just kept on blazing.
Jarrett won the pole for next Sunday’s Daytona 500 with a qualifying lap at 188.312 m.p.h. in a Ford, and Johnson locked up the other front-row starting spot with the second-best speed, 188.170 in a Chevrolet.
For Jarrett, 48, this was a major resurgence. The three-time Daytona 500 winner hadn’t been much of a factor here since 2000, when he won the pole and the race.
For Johnson, 29, this was more of the same soaring momentum that made him NASCAR’s hottest driver last fall, when he won four of the final six races, and that he carried over to his solid win in the Budweiser Shootout on Saturday night.
Jarrett hasn’t won a Nextel Cup race in nearly two years, but during the off-season he expressed confidence that his Robert Yates Racing team could return him to his old status as the man to beat in the Daytona 500. Sunday, he followed through.
“I think we can be considered a team and a car to beat next Sunday,” he said.
As to how much he impressed younger competitors, some of whom weren’t even in the Cup series when he was strong here, Jarrett had his doubts.
“Some of these guys were still in high school five years ago, so it didn’t really matter to them what I was doing–winning the pole or the Daytona 500,” he said. “I’m not even sure they were paying attention at the time.”
Whoever is at the wheel, a fast car turns heads among drivers here, and Jarrett figured that would help him regain what he hasn’t had in recent years–help in the drafting lines, where aerodynamic pushes and pulls are so vital in restrictor-plate racing at 2.5-mile Daytona International Speedway.
“One thing that always helps is that if you have a fast racecar, people tend to want to go with that car [in the draft],” Jarrett said. “I know that in the past, when we haven’t been the quickest here, I would look and figure out who had the faster cars, and those are the people I want to get hooked up with. I think that’s going to be beneficial to us.”
Since 2001 everybody has wanted to hook up with the dominant Dale Earnhardt Inc. Chevrolets of Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Michael Waltrip, who between them have won three of the last four Daytona 500s.
But Earnhardt qualified only 39th fastest and Waltrip 33rd. On top of Earnhardt’s struggle to a seventh-place finish in the Shootout, this led to questions about whether DEI’s grip on plate racing is loosening.
One symptom that the DEI situation may be critical is that “we’re way, way down on horsepower,” Earnhardt said.
Jarrett and Johnson said they expected Earnhardt and Waltrip to race much better than they qualified.
“But I’m not sure the dominance that they’ve shown is going to be there,” Jarrett said. “I think you have to look more at the Hendrick stable. It seems to be on top of their game in all aspects, but certainly for here.”
Johnson has emerged as the spearhead of the Hendrick Motorsports onslaught, and his teammate and mentor, Jeff Gordon, was third fastest in time trials at 188.155.
Johnson won eight races last year, the most in Cup, and Gordon won five. And they finished a close second and third to Kurt Busch in the Chase for the Championship.
“I’m definitely feeling a lot of momentum,” Johnson said. “Everything to do with Hendrick Motorsports is rocking.”
As for gaining on DEI in plate racing, Johnson said: “I think our team really stepped up and we were able to close that gap. Jeff won 50 percent of the plate races [one at Talladega, Ala., and the Pepsi 400 here last July] and we finished in the top five a few times. Jeff was able to get it done, and it’s up to me to learn a few more tricks.”
Jarrett and Johnson are the only two drivers whose positions are locked in for the 500. The others will be determined by a combination of time-trial speeds and the finishing orders of Thursday’s twin 150-mile (expanded this year from 125) qualifying races.
But both front-row sitters will run the qualifying races in deference to tradition.
