Last week’s Daytona 500 was both exceptional and extremely ordinary. As the premier event on the NASCAR calendar, every Daytona 500 is exceptional, as this race is considered the “Great American Race”. Some of the things that made last weekend’s race exceptional:

The 50th. Last weekends race was the fiftieth Daytona 500. The fiftieth of anything is special, whether it’s a birthday, a wedding anniversary, or a stock car race. If you don’t think the fiftieth is special, check back with me in eight years when the NFL holds it’s fiftieth Super Bowl. They will make a HUGE deal out of that one football game, so this race was special just for that reason alone.

The introduction of past winners. The tribute NASCAR paid to past winners was special. Cale Yarborough, Darrell Waltrip, and Richard Petty were among the legends recognized by NASCAR before the race. It was even cool to see Richard Petty wave the green flag to start the race.

The pre-race concert. OK, Maybe the concert didn’t seem exceptional, I mean, so what if Chubby Checker was lip syncing, he’s what, 75, 80? I’m surprised he wasn’t singing from a prescription motorized scooter. What else could we expect from NASCAR’s version of the Super Bowl? Did you think they wouldn’t have a special pre-race event?

Ryan Newman winning the race. Newman’s win automatically makes him the answer to a trivia question. When anyone asks who won the 50th Daytona 500, you won’t have to think very hard to answer them. It does seem strange, I must admit, to think that his name will be mentioned in the same breath as that of Waltrip, Yarborough, Petty and Earnhardt.

Here, also, are some of the things that made the Daytona 500 extremely ordinary, and some of these things should never happen again, as far as I’m concerned.

Jeff Hammond and Chris Meyers should never, never ever, sing on my TV again. Neither of them could carry a tune in a dump truck, and that song from “Grease” was only sang because of the racing element in the lyrics. I wish they had been lip syncing instead of Chubby.

The Gopher-cam. If you’re going to have an infield, ground level camera, someone should be assigned to come out and clean the lens every other lap or so. I personally would rather see an elevated camera put at the inside of the turns to get a “birds eye view” if you will, of the field as they make the turn. The NFL and NBA have been using elevated cameras for several years now, and it has made the television experience of their games better. I think NASCAR would definitely enhance their telecasts with a similar positioned camera.

The Gopher-cam graphics. Every time the director asked for the gopher-cam shot a cartoon gopher popped up and made some cheesy face gesture. The first time it was kind of cute and funny, but after the fourth or fifth time it was just irritating.

Uneventful racing. The whole first half of the race there were no cautions, not that cautions are good, but it does make for interesting race scenarios, what with the “lucky dog” and all. Maybe it’s because Daytona is a Super Speedway where the cars can run 3 and 4 wide, or maybe it’s due to the “car of tomorrow” and with it’s similar setups from one race team to another there’s just not much of an advantage to be had and it makes all the drivers equal to a certain extent. For whatever reason, the first half of the race is best described, in my opinion as boring.

Jeff Burton losing the lead. OK, This is more personal for me as Burton is my NASCAR favorite. His lead of nine laps vanished on the restart after the last caution with 5 laps to go. On the restart Burton was pulled into the middle of the pack like a swimmer pulled into the undertow at the beach. Of course, as the only RCR driver in the top 5 at the time, he had no teammate close to help him out.

So, there are my reasons why the Daytona 500 was both exceptional and ordinary, both exciting and boring, both an adrenaline rush and a deep letdown (see #5 above). However, that’s the nature of every sport, and NASCAR is no different in that respect, and that also is why NASCAR is the great sport it is, and we’ll all witness these things again as the schedule moves from Daytona to California.