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Pretty sweet Petty's qualifying effort gives him 10th best timePosted: Monday February 10, 2003 8:43 PMUpdated: Monday February 10, 2003 9:09 PM
By Denise N. Maloof, SI.com DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- Like the dessert he’d sampled at dinner the previous evening, Kyle Petty’s Daytona 500 qualifying effort was pretty sweet. After qualifying was delayed a day and few hours by rain, Petty dropped no crumbs once time trials began around 2:30 p.m., Monday. As the 12th of 51 qualifiers, he produced a 184.66-mph, 48.736-second effort that temporarily lodged him in the top five. And once afternoon shadows lengthened and Jeff Green had claimed the pole, Petty’s mark stood the test of time. He finished with the day’s 10th best. "I told people God blessed us today," Petty said. "Last year we came down here, and we were 42nd [actually 43rd] in points. I made it to second gear and threw a belt off leaving pit road going into qualifying, so I didn’t even get to qualify [in] the first round." This year, Petty arrived at Daytona after his 22nd-place points finish in 2002. He’s beginning the third year of his effort to rebuild Petty Enterprises -- along with John Andretti’s No. 43 team and Christian Fittipaldi’s unsponsored No. 44 -- and Monday’s qualifying effort seemed proof of slow but steady organizational gain. "We just drive," Petty said. "That’s the simple part down here. This day is for the guys who build the engines, the guys who work on the cars and build the cars. And it shows how far this team has come in a week, I think, to be able to come back and do this." Andretti didn’t fare as well. He was 36th Monday, at 182.815 mph and 49.230 seconds. Both he and Petty will participate in Thursday’s twin 125-mile qualifying races, the back-to-back events that will determine the final Daytona 500 field (only Green and second-place qualifier Dale Earnhardt Jr. locked up spots Monday). Petty will start fifth and Andretti will start 18th in the second 125-miler. But even a bad day Thursday shouldn’t jinx Petty; Monday’s time is solid enough to guarantee him a 500 spot should he have to earn it that way. "That gets us in the 500, and we don’t have to worry about anything but racing from here on out," he said. The No. 45 had been racy in Saturday’s two Daytona 500 practices. In the first practice, Petty was ninth fastest, and in the second practice he was 12th. On Monday, he thought he’d hover around the 49-second mark, just like in practice. But he didn’t expect to break it. "When we made our qualifying run on Saturday, we ran like an 09 [49.098 seconds], and we thought we should’ve run about a flat," said Petty. "And we thought we could be good and we’d thought we’d have some good laps, but that was a really, really good lap." When he arrived back on pit road following his run, he celebrated with wife Pattie and each crew member, hand-shaking and exulting. He lauded the guys back home in Level Cross, N.C. -- the engine shop, fabrication shop, body shop, particularly engine builder Mike Egge. The 42-year-old Petty is trying to wrestle a NASCAR icon back to viable shape, and it’s been anything but easy. The parting of ways with PE competition czar Robin Pemberton a month ago and the ongoing frustration of not being to secure a primary sponsor for Fittipaldi are just a few of his latest headaches. "For us this year, our motto is 'Work smart,'" said Petty, who said he’d put his employees’ work ethic up against anybody in the Winston Cup garage. "We’ve got to work smart. We’ve gotta pay attention to the little details. It’s like that book Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff. We’re sweating the small stuff right now because the small stuff is the stuff that’s going to get us caught up." That’s everything from checking window fit to proper oil temperatures. "Making sure everything’s adjusted good, making sure your coast-down on the chassis dyno is good," Petty added. "Just making sure all the little things are taken care of, because the cars are so close together now, if you don’t look after the little things, they’re going to add up and become a big thing and they bite you." |
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