|| *Comments on the 2002 Checker Auto Parts 500 Presented by Pennzoil:* View the most recent comment <#21> | Post a comment <#post> Tweet 1. Steve posted: 10.29.2006 - 2:53 am Rate this comment: (0) (0) Notables: John Andretti's final front row start in Winston Cup (2nd; finished 14th) the only Winston Cup start for the FitzBradshaw race team (Ron Hornaday finished 36th) Kurt Busch led his 1000th Winston Cup lap (6th) Emerson's son Christian Fittipaldi's debut (41st) Matt Kenseth's 20th Winston Cup Top 5 (win) Jamie McMurray's first Winston Cup DNF (40th) Elliott Sadler's 10th Top 10 and 40th lead lap finish in Winston Cup (10th) Michael Waltrip's 425th Winston Cup finish (20th) 2. Steve posted: 11.16.2006 - 5:38 am Rate this comment: (0) (0) I'm sorry; Christian Fittipaldi is the son of Wilson Fittipaldi Jr, Emerson's brother. Wilson Jr had very limited sucess in Formula 1 where his famous brother became the youngest driver in history to win the World Championship, until Spaniard Fernando Alonso reset the record in 2005. 3. bill chill posted: 05.09.2008 - 12:00 am Rate this comment: (0) (0) why did mayfield get a half a million for a 25th place finish? 4. ChazzyJoe posted: 07.16.2008 - 2:51 pm Rate this comment: (0) (0) Obviously a typo. 5. Drypor Angrysyk posted: 02.06.2010 - 4:47 am Rate this comment: (0) (0) Def Leppard put on an awesome mini-concert at the start/finish line right before this race. They blasted hits like "Pour Some Sugar On Me" & "Let's Get Rocked" ... The crowd really enjoyed it and delivered much applause. 6. AutoRockinRacing94 posted: 05.19.2010 - 2:13 pm Rate this comment: (0) (0) Don't forget that Fittipaldi is also the first Brazilian driver in NASCAR history. Just as far as I know. 7. Talon64 posted: 12.03.2010 - 6:33 pm Rate this comment: (0) (1) Matt Kenseth's 5th win of the season assured that he'd have the most in 2002. So far it's the only time in 11 full seasons in Cup he's won the most races in a year. Amazingly he'd gone winless in 2001, a sophomore slump after winning the Coke 600 as a rookie in 2000, before rattling off all of these wins. Then he wins just 1 races in 2003 and wins the championship. Ironic. 8. 1995z71 posted: 04.05.2012 - 6:26 pm Rate this comment: (0) (0) CORRECTION: Hornadays owners should be just Armando Fitz to match the Busch series team, FitzBradshaw Racing. 9. CBASS posted: 05.13.2012 - 12:44 am Rate this comment: (0) (0) Sponsor corrections: #17 DeWalt Million Dollar Challenge 10. Daniel posted: 05.25.2012 - 12:59 am Rate this comment: (0) (0) In using fastest 43: #07 Ted Musgrave & #60 Jack Sprague Out using fastest 43: #14 Mike Wallace & #49 Derrike Cope 11. CBASS posted: 01.14.2013 - 7:43 am Rate this comment: (0) (0) Sponsor updates #6 Viagra #83 RacingUSA #21 Motorcraft Quality Parts #45 Sprint PCS #37 Xtreme Motorsports Marketing #97 Rubbermaid Stain Shield/ Sharpie #15 NAPA Auto Parts http://archives.ciastockphoto.com/cgi/images.php?group=w0236 12. kidracer posted: 03.30.2014 - 9:37 pm Rate this comment: (0) (0) Casey Atwood was dumped after Rockingham with 2 races left for Jason Leffler, Atwood had no Top 10s in 2002. 13. Nascar Lead Lap Points posted: 07.26.2014 - 9:42 pm Rate this comment: (0) (0) Withdrew WD Lance Hooper 47 Dark Horse Motorsports Roger Smith Ford WD Mike Harmon 93 GIC Motorsports James Whitener Ford Two withdraw: During Speed Channel coverage of qualifying at Phoenix, it was mentioned that #93-Mike Harmon crashed in practice and the car was too damaged to fix in time and the team does not have a backup. Also #47-Lance Hooper lost an engine in practice and crashed and also withdrew.(11-8-2002) 14. ii posted: 08.25.2014 - 3:05 pm Rate this comment: (0) (0) Wasn't this the last race with the large gaps down the backstretch wall for emergency vehicles to get into the track? (at least that's what I thought it was for, never saw a race on the old layout) 15. RaceFanX posted: 11.12.2017 - 3:37 pm Rate this comment: (0) (0) NASCAR Northwest Tour regular and Winston West part-time Jeff Jefferson makes his lone Winston Cup qualifying attempt, taking the wheel of Derrike Cope's #37 entry with the team using one of its older Pontiacs instead of the Fords it ran earlier in the season, but misses the field. 16. RaceFanX posted: 03.10.2018 - 2:32 pm Rate this comment: (0) (0) The battle for the Winston Cup championship was down to a two-horse race by time this penultimate race rolled around. Tony Stewart came into Phoenix with a 112-point advantage on Mark Martin after the latter driver got dinged 25 points for a spring infraction at Rockingham meaning Smoke only needed to increase his points lead by 73 points here to clinch the title a race early. Martin would have none of that as his fourth-place finish topped Stewart's eighth to assure the championship battle would go down to the very last race of the year at Homestead. Scott Wimmer, making just his third Cup start, came into this race hot off besting Greg Biffle to win the Busch race at Phoenix a day earlier. Wimmer's luck wouldn't be as good in this one as he crashed out on the frontstretch after Robby Gordon clipped his Siemens #27 Dodge. Stewart just barely missed being collected in that crash which would have meant a big swing in the title battle if he had. 17. RaceFanX posted: 03.10.2018 - 2:48 pm Rate this comment: (0) (0) "Wasn't this the last race with the large gaps down the backstretch wall for emergency vehicles to get into the track? (at least that's what I thought it was for, never saw a race on the old layout)" This indeed was the last year for that gap before they sealed it off in 2003 when the backstretch walls were moved back. While it was used during races in later years as an emergency vehicle access area that gap was originally built as part of Phoenix's original 2.5-mile road course layout which included a section that ran outside the track. That course, including the section that came back on the oval area at that gap, was abandoned and redeveloped in 1991 when the road course was redone into a fully infield roval layout. Phoenix hosted IMSA GT, SCCA Trans-Am, and later Grand-Am races on that layout until the entire infield course was sealed off and demolished in 2010. Phoenix got an overhaul after this race that also included the removal of the famous Goodyear-branded pedestrian bridge that crossed above the track at Turn 4 so this was the last Cup race where racers drove beneath that as well. A new tunnel built under the track at Turn 4 left that bridge redundant. 18. BadBooking posted: 04.10.2019 - 8:41 pm Rate this comment: (1) (0) #7, turned out Kenseth won the most races in 2013 as well. 19. Bodyblower posted: 04.21.2020 - 10:16 am Rate this comment: (0) (0) Greg Biffle practiced the 55 car. 20. SweetRich21/43 posted: 07.31.2020 - 10:04 pm Rate this comment: (0) (0) The commentators were Allen Bestwick, Benny Parsons and Wally Dallenbach. The pit road reporters were Bill Weber, Matt Yocum, Marty Snider and Dave Burns. 21. thecautionlightnews posted: 09.23.2020 - 12:22 pm Rate this comment: (1) (0) Christian Fittipaldi becomes the first Brazilian, and by default, the first native Portuguese speaker to race in NASCAR. He also becomes the first South American to drive in NASCAR since 1959 when Eduardo Dibos ran the Firecracker 250. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *Post a comment:* Your comment may not appear immediately - all comments must be approved by the moderator. Name: Comment: