It took six hours to complete the race, but it took two days for the Great American Race to finally starting to ending. It just took a couple of detours along the way.
First, it was the weather. The rain that pummeled East Central Florida throughout the weekend caused the race to be postponed for the first time in the race's history by Mother Nature. That was supposed to be the craziest storyline of the weekend.Weather wasn't supposed to ruin the greatest spectacle in racing. Nothing, in NASCAR's eyes, could get in the way of a good Sunday race. For the first time, Monday would have to wait.
Then the waiting game spilled over into Monday night. The race finally began at 7:02 Eastern time Monday night under the lights; some compared it to being FOX's version of Monday Night Football, only with racing, of course.
Not even a lap in, the racer who has built his own dynasty in the sport had to bow out due to a wreck. By a woman.
Danica Patrick probably realized in the back of her mind that this race was going her one chance to shut up all the critics, and fire up the gender in sports conversations once again. She started out the weekend crashing not once, but twice in Nationwide and in qualifying. Three appearances, and to show for it, three wrecks.
Her critics had a ball this weekend targeting her, which in fairness, if a driver wants to make it big, one cannot wreck three separate times on the biggest weekend of that sport. Instead of starting the season on a strong note, Patrick is sitting at the back of the pack where she has been her entire career...at least in America.
At least Patrick did not hit a jet dryer, though.
Juan Pablo Montoya wanted to catch up with the rest of the field during a caution flag when he seemingly didn't see one of the jet dryer trucks and either lost control or tried to make sure he avoided it. Well, he failed on either one of those attempts. Watch here:
No one has ever seen anything like this, and through everything NASCAR does to ensure safety, I know we will never see this type of phenomenon ever again. It should not have happened in the first place, but through Montoya trying to play catch-up, the race fell back into a two hour delay. Everyone involved was not badly injured in this wreck with the exception of the track.
There was also a social media first during this two hour chaos. Due to Montoya blowing up Turn 3, the cars were halted and the red flag was out. The drivers were stuck in their cars, and to pass the time, one of the drivers believed it was a good idea to pull his phone out and update what was happening from his vantage point.
Brad Keselowski had his iPhone sitting in its special compartment during the red flag. As any Twitter user would probably do, he pulled it out and sent a picture of the fiery mess from his car's view. This started a frenzy within itself.
Keselowski (@Keselowski) went on to tweet with fans updating them about what NASCAR was saying about the wreck and why he felt he needed to carry his iPhone with him in-race. Because of it, he made social media history, but I'm sure NASCAR will have something to say about this, too. It is a law that texting (and tweeting) is prohibited while driving on roads - maybe that will spill out onto the racetrack as well.
Finally, at 12:52 Daytona time this morning, Matt Kenseth captured the most coveted flag of the Sprint Cup Series - the one at Daytona. Kenseth also won in 2009 in a less-chaotic race. That race back in '09 lasted a little less than three hours; this one took almost two full days to complete.
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