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 Monday, February 5, 2001
NASCAR opens with bang
By Jack Arute
Special to ABC Sports Online
Say what you want about the Ravens' win against the Giants in Super Bowl XXXV, the NFL certainly knows how to close the curtain on a season. Through the course of 35 years, the term "Super Bowl" has become a designation for the biggest event in sports.
That's why many wonder why stock car racing's "Super Bowl" -- the Daytona 500 -- kicks off the NASCAR season instead of ending it.
|  | | Dale Jarrett takes the checkered flag ahead of Jeff Burton in winning his third Daytona 500 last year.. |
It's easy to say tradition -- since 1959, the Daytona International Speedway has hosted snowbirds in its Florida sunshine. But there is much more to the decision than the warm weather location in the middle of winter.
Some 20 years ago, NASCAR gave serious consideration to shifting the Daytona 500 to a late November date. The Thanksgiving holiday was nixed because of the stay-at-home aspects of Turkey Day.
But a November, or even a December, Daytona 500 would put NASCAR's "Big Show" in direct conflict with the NFL and college football. These were sacrosanct institutions, college football more so than the pro game. In fact, the popularity of college football throughout the South is a major factor as to why, when NASCAR first started, races were held on Sundays.
The late Bill France Sr. knew that in order for his sport to catch on, it needed a stage with little competition. Across the South, Alabama fans, Georgia fans, Florida fans, etc. were occupied on Saturdays rooting for their favorite college team.
Until the late '60s, few NFL franchises existed below the Mason-Dixon line. That's why most of stock car racing's first wave of drivers were Washington Redskins fans. Even Cale Yarborough had a Redskins connection. After playing several seasons of semi-pro football, Yarborough was invited to an open tryout for the 'Skins, but he thought he had a better future in racing and declined.
With little interest in the NFL in the South, there was little to do on a Sunday afternoon. Moonshine had been delivered leading up to the weekend and the guys with the fast cars got their football fix on Saturdays, so it was only logical that Sundays became raceday.
By the time the Daytona 500 was started, the February date offered additional positives. It was a "tweener" time as far as professional sports seasons were concerned. ABC's Wide World of Sports was a winter mainstay on the network and when Roone Arledge started covering the Daytona 500 on Wide World of Sports, it became an annual WWOS mainstay just prior to the Winter Olympics.
By 1979, when CBS entered the picture with its first live flag-to-flag 500 coverage, the Daytona race was a perfect fit on the "eye" because it had little competition. Baseball was days away from spring training, the NBA was still years away from Michael Jordan and February was a dog month for sports programming in non-Olympic years.
Even now, the Daytona 500 has little sports competition. It is almost the only game in town (for the time that it is run). Unless you are a diehard NBA or NHL follower, the Daytona 500 comes while pro hoops and hockey engage in meaningless (as far as the playoffs are concerned) games intended to simply generate much needed revenue for individual franchises.
College hoops sometimes gives NASCAR a run for its money, but February (and Sundays) can't hold a candle to "March Madness" and Saturday college basketball.
Like the Super Bowl, the Daytona 500 may be less attended by true fans and more attended by corporate guests, but across America, racing fans gather in front of their TVs for Daytona 500 parties. The 500 is racing's only game in town ... in February. And as long as it stays there, it will remain "The Great American Race."
Jack Arute mans the pits for ABC Sports' auto racing coverage. He will contribute a regular column throughout the 2001 season for ABC Sports Online.
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 Dale Jarrett joins ESPN's Bill Weber from Daytona's Victory Lane for the Sunday Conversation.
RealVideo: | 28.8
 Passing was difficult for Jarrett, but he made it to the front.
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Dale Jarrett left his fate in the hands of his crew.
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Jeff Burton asks if the race was boring.
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Mark Martin only wanted a chance down in Daytona.
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