Pepsi 400 Live Report by Jeff Cope

Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Daytona Fans

Wednesday

I started my trip to Daytona by visiting Mickey Mouse at the beginning of the week with my family. We were met by my parents, Glenn and Helen, and brother Bob. It was a lot of fun, especially seeing my 3 year old daughter enjoying everything.

While we were there, Bob and I decided to check out the Richard Petty Driving Experience. We decided to just ride this time rather than try driving. Since it was the day before Daytona, Jeff Gordon volunteered to come to the track and drive Bob and me around. Well, okay so I'm kidding. It was a lot of fun trying to get the feel of what it's like going around the track.

Thursday

There was one word for today: HOT! We arrived outside the track about 7:15am and by 8:30am we were already drenched. The humidity and heat was terrible. As we found out later, the heat index was 110 degrees. A lot of people said that it was the hottest Pepsi 400 weekend in history. My father and I headed to the credentials office to get our garage passes. After awhile, we were in the garage area watching all the drivers and teams with their cars. We snapped many pictures of the various drivers walking around before practice started.

We went to the SKITTLES® garage and were able to introduce ourselves to Jay Frye (general manager). He invited us to stand on top of the transporter during practice which of course we were not going to deny.

We then went back to meet my mother and since it was still early, we went to the souvenir trailer and made all our purchases. The trailer keeps getting new items in so we all ended up buying a number of items. Bob ended up meeting us at the trailer too.

Dad and I went back to the garage and headed over to the SKITTLES® transporter, and not long after, my father spotted Derrike without his uniform walking to the transporter. We said hello, got him to sign each of our hats, and I was able to take a picture of Dad and Derrike. Dad was really thrilled to finally have met Derrike. We decided to hang out there for a little longer to see Derrike head to the car for practice. This time he was in his uniform, and again Dad was thrilled to see the bright SKITTLES® colors.

Practice was ready to start and we went to the top of the transporter to join Jay, Ryan Pemberton (crew chief), and Dianna Drayson (SKITTLES® PR person). It was fun watching practice from there even though we didn't really see much, as Derrike would take a lap and back into the garage the car would go for adjustments. Derrike was complaining of the setup on the car as it was really loose and almost impossible to drive with the car bottoming out. They had used the same setup as Talladega but apparently something was different this time.

In the middle of practice, we decided to join my mother and Bob who were sitting in the grandstands. Derrike came out on the track a couple more times but we never were able to hear what their final resolution on the car was.

After lunch, first round qualifying started with Derrike coming out 41st. By then, Mike Skinner had held on to the pole position from the very start since he was the first car on the track. It seemed that the early cars had the better times as the later ones like Terry Labonte were unable to do better than the 'teens.

Just before Derrike came out, Dale Earnhardt posted a 4th starting position, so we had hoped that even though the car had problems in practice that the team could end up in at least the top 25. Derrike came out and did exactly that, 25th with a time of 48.124. There were four more cars and even though he was on the bubble, we were hoping he could stay there. Sterling Marlin was next and eventually went back to the garage without taking a lap so that left three cars to go. Unfortunately though, all three posted better times which left Derrike in 28th. Since they had problems with the setup, we guessed that they would stand on their time and just start working toward Saturday.

At night, we went to the Airport where Derrike was going to be part of Thundersports Live hosted by Hill Overton. Mom was able to meet him and get his autograph this time. Before the show started, I was able to meet fellow fans Skip Hohensee and Angela Walker.

Derrike was the first guest of four (him, Jeff Green, Kenny Wallace, and Rick Mast). When asked about qualifying, Derrike said that they would probably stand on their time and guessed they would end up in the top 30-32 cars. Hill Overton stated that the SKITTLES® Race Team is at this time the highest finishing new team in NASCAR. Derrike talked about how a qualifying setup was completely different than the race setup, with the qualifying setup being a very rough ride. They try to get the car not too high in the front and try to prevent the car from bottoming out in the rear, unlike it was doing today. But Derrike did state about the race and where they would be starting, "Keep an eye on us because we won't be back there long." They gave out two SKITTLES® hats based on trivia questions. I should have won one but they must have misunderstood what I said, but at least Skip was able to win one.

Friday

Friday began with practice at 9:00am until 11:30am. I checked in the garage and found that the team had decided to stand on their time. Later on though, there was some question to this as they were timing the other cars that were going to requalify and talked about waiting until the end of practice before "signing up." I guessed that this might mean signing up to requalify. As it turned out, the team did end up standing on their time.

The SKITTLES® car finally got on the track at 9:40am for some practice. Derrike waited for the drafting pack and then led the pack around for about 20 laps. He then moved back into the middle of the pack for drafting purposes. At 25 laps the temperature was still fine in the engine. Around 50 laps (10:20am), they pulled it in to check the tires. The car had no problem staying with the pack during the practice. They gassed up the car which I took as meaning they were done practicing. From what I could hear on the scanner, they thought that maybe a couple of the cars that were going to requalify might have better times than them so they were going to be okay.

Since the team seemed done practicing, we left to get out of the heat, and headed for the K-Mart where Kevin Meador was with the show car. When we got there, Skip Hohensee had beat us there and Kevin had already put him to work handing out postcards. We all had fun talking about racing while many visitors received their free postcards and trial-size SKITTLES® candies. I then left with my parents to relax for the afternoon. Due to the heat and the team standing on their time, we decided to skip the 2nd round qualifying and Happy Hour. As it turned out, the fastest car in second round qualifying ended up in 29th position so Derrike was able to stay in 28th. Skip did attend Happy Hour and said Derrike looked good on the track.

At night, all the fan club members in town met at Portofino restaurant for dinner. Attending were Skip Hohensee (and Russ), Angela Walker (and Doug), Cyndi Price (and Kelly), Glenn and Helen Cope, Kevin Meador, and me. A great dinner was had by all. Also at the restaurant when we were there were Ricky Rudd, Dale Jarrett, Larry McReynolds, and Robert Yates. Unfortunately, Derrike was unable to attend. After dinner, Kevin opened up the show car trailer and we all ended up buying some souvenirs. Thanks to Kevin for arranging the dinner for everyone to enjoy.

Saturday

My day started when the alarm clock woke me up at 4:00am. By 4:50am we were at the track and of course were able to find a close parking spot. After breakfast at Friendly's, we went to the track. Fortunately, the day turned out to be a little cloudy even though it was humid. This made it feel 100% better than the previous two days.

While we were waiting for 10:15am driver introductions, I headed down to the pits to watch the team get the pit area ready. At the pit I met Randy, Don, and Ken setting up the pit. It was interesting to hear that Don's wife follows the website every week. I hope we can have more information on the rest of the SKITTLES® Race Team in the future.

At the beginning of the race, the SKITTLES® Pontiac was performing well with Derrike moving up through the field. Ryan Pemberton would encourage Derrike as he was moving up with statements like "good job buddy, you're doing great." Derrike rode most of the day high on the track. At one time he tried going to the bottom and said that he kept slipping there so he would have to stay at the top.

On lap 33, there was a caution and Derrike went into the pits in 13th position. The team was going to take 2 tires but to be safe since others were going to take 4 tires, they decided to take 4 tires and put one pound on the right front. The car came out in 8th position with Derrike complementing the crew on a great pit stop.

At lap 70 and running in 13th, Ryan asked how Derrike felt and he replied everything was fine. At lap 77, they decided to pit around lap 88-89 and were trying to get Ricky Rudd to pit with them. Rudd's team kept deciding what to do so on lap 89, Derrike pitted with Dick Trickle instead. They took 4 tires and took a round of wedge out and put the right front back in.

On lap 107 with Derrike in 10th, the #33 car went into the wall causing a caution. Since the tires had 15 laps on the left side, the team decided to just take right side tires and gas. Derrike said it would be loose for awhile but they would just have to live with it. Ryan replied that everyone else was going to take 2 tires too, and in practice they had run 10 lap tires with no problem so they were great all around - tires, gas, and position. The pit crew got the SKITTLES® Pontiac out in 4th position for their best position of the day.

Lap 127 had Jeff Gordon into the wall. Derrike apologized saying that he had to go into the grass to avoid Gordon since he came back across the track. With 34 laps to go, Ryan asked Derrike if he needed any more adjustments and Derrike replied no, so they pitted to lower a roof flap and get tires and gas. Ryan assured that with 4 new tires they would be able to get back the lost track position. Derrike said, "we'll get 'em."

Derrike restarted the race on lap 129 in 27th position. With five laps to go, there was another caution and Ryan encouraged Derrike to "race, race, race - go hard" back to the line. They thought Derrike was in 15th and the race would probably end under the caution but turned out there would be one final lap under the green.

On the final lap, with Derrike giving it all to gain positions, there was an incident between turns 3 and 4 with a number of cars. The spotter told Derrike to go high, go low, do anything to get through there. Unfortunately, he was unable to do so and got collected with one of the cars coming off the wall. It took a long time to get a final finish because of all the cars involved in the final crash, but Derrike ended up in 28th position. Fortunately, he was not seriously injured.

Then we headed off to fight the traffic out of the speedway. On the way out I was listening to MRN radio on the scanner and was surprised to hear that the Goody's Headache Powder award went to Jeff Gordon for all his troubles. The major incident with him was totally caused by himself by running into the wall. Before the race, they gave out a lot of awards to him and his team for the previous California race. It's interesting how even when he does bad, he still gets awards.

It was to be a historic and nostalgic day since next year's Pepsi 400 will be run under the lights.