1991 Daytona 500 By STP

Race details
Race 1 of 29 in the1991 NASCAR Winston Cup Series
The 1991 Daytona 500 program cover, featuringRichard Petty.
Date	February 17, 1991 (1991-02-17)
Official name	33rd Annual Daytona 500 By STP
Location	Daytona Beach, Florida,Daytona International Speedway
Course	Permanent racing facility
Course length	2.5 miles (4.0 km)
Distance	200 laps, 500 mi (804.672 km)
Average speed	148.148 miles per hour (238.421 km/h)
Attendance	145,000
Pole position
Driver	Davey Allison	Robert Yates Racing
Time	45.929
Most laps led
Driver	Kyle Petty	SABCO Racing
Laps	51
Winner
No. 4	Ernie Irvan	Morgan–McClure Motorsports
Television in the United States
Network	CBS
Announcers	Ken Squier,David Hobbs,Ned Jarrett
Radio in the United States
Radio	Motor Racing Network

The1991 Daytona 500 By STP was the firststock car race of the1991 NASCAR Winston Cup Series season and the 33rd iteration of theevent. The race was held on Sunday, February 17, 1991, before an audience of 145,000 inDaytona Beach, Florida atDaytona International Speedway, a 2.5 miles (4.0 km) permanent triangular-shaped superspeedway. The race took the scheduled 200 laps to complete. Following a period of three late-race cautions,Morgan–McClure Motorsports driverErnie Irvan took the lead fromDale Earnhardt with six laps left in the race. With three laps to go, Earnhardt spun and collectedDavey Allison andKyle Petty, bringing out the final caution with two laps left. Coasting to the finish on fumes, Irvan was able to take his second careerNASCAR Winston Cup Series victory, his first victory of the season, and his only Daytona 500 victory.^[1][2][3] To fill out the top three,Junior Johnson & Associates driverSterling Marlin andRahMoc Enterprises driverJoe Ruttman finished second and third, respectively.

Daytona International Speedway is one of twosuperspeedways to holdNASCAR races, the other beingTalladega Superspeedway. The standard track at Daytona International Speedway is a four-turn superspeedway that is 2.5 miles (4.0 km) long. The track's turns are banked at 31degrees, while thefront stretch, the location of the finish line, is banked at 18 degrees.

This race began a series of changes to pit road procedure after the death of aMelling Racing rear tire changer in a pit road accident atAtlantathe previous November.

• Changing tires under caution was banned, under any circumstances. Any tire changed under caution (even if it was flat) resulted in a one-lap penalty.
• The signboard man was banned from standing in the pit lane. Instead, teams would utilize signboards on a long pole (i.e. the "lollipop") held by a crew member behind the wall.
• Each car was given a sticker based on their starting position. The sticker was placed on the steering wheel for easy reference. The pit stall selection was staggered to prevent drivers in neighboring stalls from pitting at the same time:
  • Cars starting in odd-numbered positions were given a blue sticker with a white 1 on it; their pit stalls were selected from the odd-numbered stalls.
  • Cars starting in even-numbered positions were given an orange sticker with a white 2 on it; their pit stalls were selected from the even-numbered stalls.
• After a restart from a caution, the pits would be closed. On the second green lap, a blue flag was waved at the entrance of pit road, allowing only the cars with the blue stickers (odd) to pit for tires. On the next time around, an orange flag would be waved, allowing the cars with orange stickers (even) to pit for tires.
• A new pit road speed limit was implemented at all times. During cautions, a second pace car was added, which would lead the cars entering the pits, and set the speed down the pit lane.
• Penalties were severe: a 1-lap penalty for changing tires during a caution or pitting with the wrong group (blue/orange). A 15-second penalty for overshooting the pit stall, or for crew members jumping over the wall too soon.

The new pit procedures changed the complexity of the race. Teams considered it too time-consuming to change four tires since it had to be done under green (at the time, a four-tire pit stop would take roughly 20–25 seconds). For an example of how the rules adversely affected the racing,Kyle Petty ran the entire 500 miles on the same left side tires.Bill Elliott suffered a flat tire early on, and was forced to limp around the track at a reduced pace for two laps before he was allowed to pit, effectively eliminating him from the competition.

By April, the rules were changed. At Bristol, the blue/orange procedure was used only for cautions. The pits were closed at the onset of caution, then opened after the pace car had picked up the leader and the field was sufficiently "packed-up" (that usually took one lap). Once the pits were opened, blue sticker cars would pit the first lap by, with orange sticker cars pitting the next time around. On the restarts, blue sticker cars started on the inside and orange sticker cars on the outside. Lapped cars went to the rear. The blue/orange rule was eliminated during green flag stops. By the next week at North Wilkesboro, the blue/orange rule was scrapped. In its place, once the pits were opened during a yellow, lead lap cars only were allowed to pit on the first lap under caution, while lapped cars had to wait until the second lap.

After a few weeks, the rules were relaxed further. The pit road speed limit and use of the "lollipop" style signboard were the significant changes made permanent (and remain to this day). The second pace car for the pit lane was eliminated. Drivers would be required to gauge their own pit lane speed (by monitoring their RPMs) and officials enforced the infractions with a system similar toVASCAR. The rule closing pit road when the caution comes out also remained in place, as well as only permitting lead lap cars to pit on the first caution lap (lapped cars on the second).

• (R) denotes rookie driver.

• A notable absentee was1972 Daytona 500 winnerA. J. Foyt. Foyt was badly injured in theTexaco-Havoline 200IndyCar race atRoad America in the fall of1990. He suffered severe injuries to his feet and legs, and spent several months out of a racecar before returning to action atIndianapolis in May 1991. Foyt missed his first Daytona 500 since1965.

Qualifying was set by the1991 Gatorade Twin 125 Qualifiers. The top two positions were set by qualifying speeds held for the Twin 125 Qualifiers held on Saturday, February 9, with the top two qualifiers in the session earning the top two positions for the Daytona 500. The rest of the starting was set in the Twin 125 Qualifiers, held on Thursday, February 14 during two races. The top 14 finishers in the first race, excluding the pole position winner, would set the inside row from rows two to 15, and the top 14 finishers in the second race, excluding the outside pole position winner, would set the outside row from rows two to 15. The remaining non-qualifiers would set positions 31-40 based on qualifying speeds from the first qualifying session held on Saturday. If needed, up to two extra provisionals were given to teams high enough in the previous season's owner's standings that did not qualify for the race by either qualifying speed or from the Twin 125 Qualifiers.

Davey Allison, driving forRobert Yates Racing, won the pole with a time of 45.929 and an average speed of 195.955 miles per hour (315.359 km/h) in Saturday's session.^[4]

16 drivers failed to qualify.

Davey Allison led the first lap, but was soon passed on lap two byDale Earnhardt, who took the lead entering Turn 1. Shortly into the race, Earnhardt hit aseagull with the left-front corner of his car. This adversely affected his car's water temperature, raising it at one point to 240 °F or 116 °C. It forced Earnhardt's team to make emergency repairs under one of the many early cautions in the race.

Sprint car championSammy Swindell spun on the backstretch to bring out the firstyellow flag. Five laps after the restart,Rick Wilson andGreg Sacks collided in Turn 1, ending Sacks' day. Just after the restart,Bill Elliott cut a tire, but had to wait for the proper lap for a pit stop. On lap 31,Jimmy Spencer's engine blew, fillingthe car with smoke. Afire also erupted just afterSpencer climbed out to catch his breath. Meanwhile, turn 4 was coated withoil, gatheringJeff Purvis,Jimmy Means,Phil Barkdoll, and againSammy Swindell.Barkdoll would soon spin again in Turn 4, blowing out hiswindshield in the spin and nearly flipping. The windshield slid across the track and intoKen Schrader's bumper and air dam, puncturing the radiator and causing a lengthy repair that eliminated the three-time Daytona 500 polesitter from contention. 1990 Winston Cup runner-upMark Martin moved through the field quickly in the early going, but was also eliminated from contention as the center section of the car's rear gearing sheared completely off of the driveshaft, causing him to spend many laps behind the wall.

On Lap 75,Geoff Bodine,Eddie Bierschwale andPhil Barkdoll ran three-wide coming out of turn 4. Bierschwale slid up the track and into Bodine's left-rear quarter panel, sending Bodine into a spin and intoJim Sauter, who was slowing to enter the pits. The caution flag came out and all four cars continued in the race. However, Bodine spent several laps in the pits because the rim of his left-rear wheel had been so badly warped in the collision that the crew could not remove the lug nuts to change the now flat left-rear tire. This incident effectively eliminated Bodine from contention and he later retired with an oil leak.

This would be the last caution flag for over 100 laps, and the new pit rules confused the running order during the longgreen flag run. The lead changed hands many times, asDale Earnhardt,Joe Ruttman,Davey Allison,Sterling Marlin,Rick Mast,Kyle Petty,Ernie Irvan, andDarrell Waltrip had all pitted on varying laps.

With 16 laps to go,Richard Petty andoff-road racerRobby Gordon tangled on the backstretch.Polesitter and leaderDavey Allison pitted with the leaders, allowingRusty Wallace to take the lead. He was quickly shuffled off of the lead on the restart, and was touched byKyle Petty in Turn 4, which broke the car loose and sent him into a spin.Rick Mast narrowly avoided Wallace, butDarrell Waltrip, unsighted, collided with Wallace's left rear quarter panel, before Wallace slammed into the inside retaining wall, eliminating both cars. Seconds later,Derrike Cope lost control entering the tri-oval while trying to avoid Waltrip's damaged car. Cope spun across the infield and back across the track almost at the start/finish line and into the path ofHut Stricklin. With nowhere to go, Stricklin slammed nearly head-on into the rear of Cope's car, sending him bouncing offHarry Gant's car and down the straightaway with no brakes and virtually no steering. At the final restart on lap 193, the order was Earnhardt, Irvan, Petty, Ruttman, Marlin, Mast, and Allison, the only cars remaining on the lead lap. LeaderDale Earnhardt was passed byErnie Irvan a lap after thegreen flag returned, andDavey Allison made up four positions in one lap to run third. Irvan began to pull away while Earnhardt spent several laps battlingDavey Allison for 2nd. With 2 laps to go, Earnhardt gotloose while running side by side under Allison exiting turn 2. The two cars tapped each other, pushing Allison into the outside wall briefly before the car spun into the infield towards Lake Lloyd, slamming into the earthen embankment as Allison had done early in the 1989 race. Earnhardt spun down the backstretch and into the path ofKyle Petty, who slammed into Earnhardt's right front fender, launching the car into the air briefly before it landed back on its wheels.Ernie Irvan coasted to thecheckers to become the firstCalifornian sinceMarvin Panch in1961 to win theDaytona 500.

Drivers' Championship standings Pos Driver Points 1 Ernie Irvan 180 2 Sterling Marlin 175 (-5) 3 Joe Ruttman 170 (-10) 4 Rick Mast 165 (–15) 5 Dale Earnhardt 160 (–20) 6 Dale Jarrett 150 (–30) 7 Bobby Hillin Jr. 146 (–34) 8 Alan Kulwicki 142 (–38) 9 Ricky Rudd 138 (–42) 10 Bobby Hamilton 134 (–46) Official driver's standings Note: Only the first 10 positions are included for the driver standings.

• 1991 in sports in Florida
• 1991 NASCAR Winston Cup Series
• February 1991 sports events in the United States
• NASCAR races at Daytona International Speedway

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