Volume I, Issue 1, Page 34

Chevrolet, like the other manufacturers in NASCAR racing uses their own internal equipment to help build a better racecar. Here is a NASCAR Monte Carlo SS in the wind tunnel getting checked out for air flow. The ‘smoke’ shows them how the air goes over the car and helps to indicate areas for improvement in downforce, aero and handling adjustments.
Here’s the guy that won the 2006 Daytona 500 with the brand new Chevy Monte Carlo SS, Jimmie Johnson driving the Lowe's Home Improvement #48 from Hendrick Motorsports. Jeff Gordon is actually part owner of the team.

DAYTONA

Here’s another Daytona tidbit that Chevy fans can get into. When 43 of NASCAR’s finest took the green at the 2006 Daytona 500, they were all following a Chevy. And that Chevy had more horsepower than they did. The pace car for the 500 was a Z06 Corvette driven by comedian, Jay Leno. Jay’s a confirmed gearhead so he knew what was going on and had some fun with it. "I love the Corvette Z06 with its 505 horsepower,” said Jay. “Actually, I believe this is the first time in history of the race when the pace car has more horsepower than the actual race cars. So I could theoretically blow them into the weeds.” Jay was taking a shot at the dreaded restrictor plates that choke down power to about 450 instead of the usual 800 plus. The plates are used at Daytona and Talladega to keep speeds down and cars on the track. Yet, the engines are still pushing the cars to more than 190 mph on the back straights.

Leno went on talking about Chevys, "I have a new Z06 coming, I like the new one. I have a 2002 Z06 that we have upgraded a bit. It has about 600 horsepower. It goes pretty good. That is another thing that is kind of cool about the Corvette that you can't do with a lot of the other super cars. It is interesting, whenever you watch these tuner shows, like the Car and Driver thing. The cars that show up and win are the Corvettes and the Porsches. Lamborghini, Ferrari, they break. This is a Chevy, you fix it with a hammer. You take it, beat the hell out of it, when it breaks, you can fix it. In the truest sense of a backyard mechanic kind of way there is a relationship with these cars that you don't really get with a lot of the other super cars. I always hear the Ferrari guys brag about how few miles they have on their cars - it is a '95 and it only has 800 miles.  Well, good for you, I guess that is great, I don't quite get the point of that." It sounds like Jay is one of us…

Well, hardcore Chevy fans know Chevrolet drivers dominated Daytona Speedweeks starting with the non-points, all-star style race, the Budweiser Shootout where they won and finished second, third and fifth. Next came qualifying for the Daytona 500 and it was an all-Chevy front row for the two fastest cars. In the Gatorade Duels qualifying races, Chevy took third and fourth in one and first and second in the other. Next was the NASCAR Busch Series race where Chevy drivers swept the top three spots and took four of the top five places. In the biggie, the Daytona 500, Chevy was the winner for the fourth consecutive time and 19th overall for Chevrolet at the Daytona 500, the most of any manufacturer. (Insert high five here!)


NASCAR’s inspection area, often referred to as the ‘Room of Doom,’ is where all those templates are tried on the car to see how they fit. Here, the one that spans the entire length of the car goes on.

But real NASCAR fans know there’s always some drama to be found. This time is was plastered all over the mainstream news, too. Jimmy Johnson, in the Lowe's #48 Monte Carlo failed post-qualifying template inspection in the rear window area. That was big. His car was fitted with a clever device that lifted up the rear window to decrease drag by diverting air over the rear spoiler. It was an obvious way around the rules and as such, the team’s qualifying time was disallowed. NASCAR doesn’t like to be embarrassed so they sent out a message to the troops in the garage by ejecting crew chief, Chad Knaus, from any further participation in the Daytona 500. That was bigger. They later fined him $25,000 and increased his ‘benching’ to include the next three races. Knaus has incurred the wrath of NASCAR numerous times before for his, shall we say, creative interpretations of their rules and was put on what amounts to ‘double secret probation’ for the rest of the year.


Even though he hasn’t won a championship yet, Dale Earnhardt Jr. is treated like royalty by his many fans.

Knaus said of the ejection, "It's obviously disappointing to miss the biggest race of the year, but I'm confident in Darian (acting crew chief) and the rest of my teammates. There's been a lot of effort put into the Daytona 500 and I know the team will be successful with the support they'll receive from the entire organization." When asked if they had used the same trick before, Knaus, in what may be classic double-speak, said, "No, it was used last year; we got in trouble this year. If it had been wrong last year, we would have gotten caught with it last year. That is it plain and simple. Their inspection process is very thorough. If we had done something wrong, we would have gotten in trouble last year if we had it, and we didn't."