|| *Comments on the 2003 Sam's Town 300:* View the most recent comment <#16> | Post a comment <#post> Tweet 1. Chicago posted: 05.20.2005 - 1:15 am Rate this comment: (1) (0) Jeff Burton had the best car in this race; he dug himself from thirtieth starting spot on the grid [due to the rain outs of qualifying] and was running second (after leading for a good portion] when his car caught fire after a part failure. 2. Steve posted: 01.06.2007 - 1:30 am Rate this comment: (0) (0) Unofficially stuntman Stanton Barrett's first Busch Pole Award. 3. Darrell posted: 01.19.2007 - 6:34 pm Rate this comment: (0) (0) Dang, here's a rare sighting. Mike McLaughlin on the DNQ list. This would have happened even if the Angela's Motorsports team was legit. And on top of it all, isn't Las Vegas in the desert? What's with the rain-outs? 4. Anonymous posted: 01.16.2009 - 9:25 pm Rate this comment: (0) (2) Steve Park got screwed in this race. He was spun in the early stages and flat spotted his tires, but NASCAR wouldn't allow his team to change them without suffering a penalty. 5. The Great Dave posted: 11.01.2009 - 9:56 am Rate this comment: (0) (0) The Sponsor on the #49 should be Reality Entertainment/Circus Circus The Sponsor on the 77 should be The Orleans/Coldwell Banker 6. sk posted: 04.03.2012 - 3:52 pm Rate this comment: (0) (0) last (and best) start for driver-turned-owner Robby Benton. 7. Sam posted: 02.27.2013 - 4:13 pm Rate this comment: (0) (0) Michael Waltrip and Jamie McMurray had a wicked fiery crash in practice, but both were ok and started in backup cars. 8. 83andJoe posted: 08.19.2013 - 7:06 pm Rate this comment: (0) (0) #87 crew chief: Eric Phillips (same for all races with the #87 this year EXCEPT those races driven by Kyle Busch, race #9 at Fontana, and race #10 at Richmond). 9. 83andJoe posted: 08.20.2013 - 5:56 pm Rate this comment: (0) (0) #33 crew chief: Mark Tutor (same for all races this year) 10. CBASS posted: 01.08.2014 - 10:40 am Rate this comment: (0) (0) Sponsor updates #18 MBNA America #59 Kingsford Match Light #16 31-W Insulation/ Waterloo Tool Storage #27 Alice Cooper http://www.motorsport.com/nascar-ns/photos/main-gallery/?s=5&y=2003&r=7336 11. Foyt14 posted: 10.18.2018 - 11:13 am Rate this comment: (0) (0) The 43 should be a Dodge not a Chevy. 12. Land0nFand0n posted: 02.20.2019 - 8:41 pm Rate this comment: (0) (0) Bruce Bechtel's best career Busch Series finish in 24th. 13. rm posted: 05.10.2020 - 10:27 am Rate this comment: (1) (0) 1 crew chief - Donnie Wingo 8 crew chief - Kevin Manion 9 crew chief - Paul Andrews 99 crew chief - Bobby Kennedy 71 sponsor - RB1 Motorsports Jamie McMurray and the Phoenix team had been planning to run the same car here as they had the weekend prior at Rockingham, but when the Rockingham race was pushed to Monday they had to abandon that plan. The team loaded an old Chevy that had last been raced by Jimmy Spencer the year before as their backup car. And, of course, McMurray wrecked in practice and had to hop in the Chevrolet, which apparently still had the seat fitted for Spencer in the car. That wasn't the last drama of the weekend for the team as crew chief Johnny Allen quit the team mid-day Friday, the day before the race. McMurray, car owner James Finch, and spotter Marc Reno scrambled to set something up and called on McMurray's Cup crew chief, Donnie Wingo, to lead the team temporarily on race day. Despite the team getting thrown curveball after curveball, McMurray ran in the top five for much of the race before he fell victim to a dead battery after the red flag for rain was lifted. Jeff Burton's car spontaneously combusting under caution while he was running 2nd is about as bad a break as you could possibly catch. Burton said he thought he had a problem with his car just before that, but his guess was that he just had a flat tire. It wound up being much more catastrophic than that. He wasn't the last driver to exit the race while under caution. Bobby Hamilton Jr. also went aflame while sitting on pit road. Karma for blatantly junking Chris Bingham, perhaps? Matt Kenseth had to start from the rear after qualifying was rained out, and the crew changed the engine as well. Kenseth was black flagged at the start of the race and was held a lap on pit road under the first caution. Kenseth raced off pit road to avoid falling even further behind, but instead had to come right back down pit road and into the garage with a mechanical issue. In the 2002 running of this race, Kenseth lasted 13 laps. Here, he only made it 6 laps in. A caution for rain flew on lap 136 as Todd Bodine and Michael Waltrip were battling for the lead. With the already-ominous storm clouds getting darker by the minute, Bodine and Waltrip staged a dogfight racing back to the caution flag that very well could have been the checkered flag too. Bodine beat Waltrip to the line by inches, if that, and the crew went wild in celebration. Unfortunately for Bodine & the Herzog bunch, the race was able to get back underway after a red flag period. Even more unfortunate for Bodine, he spun from the lead on lap 169, but no caution flag waved for the incident. 14. KyleBrown posted: 07.14.2020 - 4:39 pm Rate this comment: (1) (0) Because this was within the first four races of the season, rainout qualifying results were...quite odd. As per usual, the top 35 in 2002 owner's points (that entered this race) were the first criteria. However, the 19, 36, 5 (Vickers used the 24's old points), 47, 94 (well, they still existed technically), and others had shut down without a new car claiming their owner points, while: the 4 took over the 14; the 73 took over the 66; the 70 took over the 63 (really the same team, Ken Alexander was majority/part owner of the 63 in 2002 IIRC); the 39 took over the 40; and the 22 took over the 98. Then was any owner who won in the prior calendar year, which the 8 fulfilled thanks to Junior. Then any driver who won in the prior calendar year, which Johnny Sauter fulfilled. Next was any past champions, but none were in the field. Next is where the criteria differed. Usually, the final criteria was qualifying attempts with owner's points tiebreaker. However, this clearly was not the criteria for this race (and Darlington, for that matter). For instance--the 52 had 18 attempts in 2002, and had the most attempts of the remaining cars, but DNQ'd. I haven't found anything proving this, but it appears slots 38+ were sorted by 2003 owner's points. And this makes the most sense--the 19 was ahead of the 17 after two races, who was ahead of the 18, etc. It all checks out, until obviously you get to teams with zero 2003 points (the 01, 00, and 08)--tiebreakers in this scenario were typically something arbitrary, like qualifying order or when the entry was received, or maybe even 2002 points/attempts (of which the 01 had 2). The Darlington qualifying results also are consistent with this, notably with the 18 passing the 19. And it makes sense that NASCAR would do it this way in the BGN series considering the lack of stability in many teams, both small and large. Now, why teams like the 19 and 5 didn't have a "replacement team" remains a mystery to me (they're not filled in Darlington either). 15. KyleBrown posted: 07.14.2020 - 9:01 pm Rate this comment: (0) (0) Correction to my last post--the 94 turned into the 22, as Danny Bost was part-owner of the 94 (hence DF2, for Danny and Fred), while the 94 run throughout 2003 was Bickford's separate operation. And I'm not sure if the 39 took over the 40 or 98 as a result. 16. Rich posted: 12.25.2020 - 6:59 am Rate this comment: (0) (0) Mike Joy, Larry McReynolds and Darrell Waltrip were the commentators. Dr. Dick Berggren, Steve Byrnes, Matt Yocum and Jeanne Zelasko were the pit road reporters. Chris Myers and Jeff Hammond were in the Hollywood hotel. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *Post a comment:* Your comment may not appear immediately - all comments must be approved by the moderator. Name: Comment: