Hauler drivers face concerns after Daytona 500 delay

The unsung heroes of NASCAR teams each and every week, are about to have a very tough week ahead of them.


Every NASCAR fan care about the driver and a crew chief. It takes a special fan to pay attention to the pit crew. It takes a die-hard to care about the member in the worst shape after the Daytona 500 is finally in the books -- the hauler driver.


Depending the week and the tracks in question, a hauler driver could drive thousands of miles transporting cars to and from the track and the team facility.


This week, it's going to be even worse. After the Daytona 500 is complete, whether it's Monday night or Tuesday morning, it's going to be a long week for all of the hauler drivers.


When the race is over, the crew must pack up the car and take it back to the home-base in Mooresville, N. C., or about 504 miles away according to Google Maps. That's about an eight and a half hour drive.

After unloading all the Daytona equipment, teams must load equipment and cars for the race at Phoenix the following weekend. That can't be a quick process, I'll guess it would be about a three-hour event. So far, we are at a minimum 11 and a half hours from Daytona to ready to leave for Phoenix.

The drive from Moorseville to Phoenix International Raceway is a long one, 2,110 miles. Google Maps says it would take one day and nine hours, or 33 hours one way. That's puts us at a total of 44 and a half hours from Daytona to Phoenix not including sleep and rest stops. That's not going to be an easy trip for anybody.

"I just was looking at the schedule earlier today," Carl Edwards said. "We're not on the track till midday Friday or something.  Yeah, if we were to put this out until Tuesday, I think that would be real tough.


"But I'm sure it will be fine.  I mean, we've got guys, they can do it.  I know our Phoenix stuff is ready to go.  I think there might be an issue with some of the engines, especially with our FR-9s.  Have to ask Jack.  Doug Yates, the quantity, the amount of engines we had to have ready for these races, I'm sure they'll be running back and forth and turning things over."


That may be a simple transfer for teams as big as Roush, but the smaller teams may have issues.

Bobby Labonte of JTG Dougherty Racing is concerned for the hauler driver's safety.

"It's going to make a tough trip for the truck drivers more than anything else, leaving here, when we do leave here, to go home and make a swap," Labonte said. "How many hours will that take?  You have to make sure that you're planned well enough that your truck drivers can get there in the amount of time that's out there.  It's a long ways.  So we'll see."

The drivers have to be parked in the Phoenix infield by 5 a.m. Friday, moved from 5 p.m. Thursday, to get prepared for the weekend festivities. So if you see a NASCAR Hauler behind you this week, be sure to get out of the way and let them go. They are going to be in as much of a hurry as the NASCAR drivers will be at Daytona.

Labor Day letdown at Atlanta

The 2011 NASCAR season started splendidly with six months of near-perfect weather every week, but that came crashing to an end in the second half of the season.

Hardly a practice session was disrupted by rain in what was one of the longest stretches of good weather in recent NASCAR history, but qualifying was washed out in Kentucky in July and the rain began to infest race weekends on a more regular basis.

Rain interrupted the August race at Pocono for nearly two hours before it caused the entire race to be postponed the following week at Watkins Glen until Monday.

Cancelling qualifying is a bummer, and rain delays during a race make for a long day, but both are better than what Tropical Storm Lee dumped on the holiday weekend race at Atlanta.

Intense rain storms made for a surreal evening and crushed sporting events throughout the country. Lightning even struck the football stadium at West Virginia University during a game against Marshall.

Unfortunately, the rain this weekend couldn’t have happened at a worse time.

Atlanta Motor Speedway now has only one race a year, and the Labor Day race has always been one of NASCAR’s premier events.

Every thing was set for a nice evening of racing to be followed by a holiday, where many people don’t have to get up for work the next day. Then the rain came down in buckets.

The worst part is the race has been postponed for two days because more and more rain is expected Monday. The race has been rescheduled for 11 a.m. ET Tuesday.

Many people might be upset the race has been pushed back all the way to a work day even though there was a buffer day with the holiday on Monday, but NASCAR didn't have much of a choice.

The fun choice may have been to wait the rain out Sunday night and have an overnight race if there was ever a long enough break in the rain to run some laps.

NASCAR certainly didn’t want the circumstances to come together. The television ratings are going to be terrible as most people are back at work, and who knows what the attendance numbers will look like. They likely will be way down because many fans came to the track as part of the extended weekend and won’t be able to add an extra day to their vacation.

So, what should have been one of the better weekends on the NASCAR schedule turned into one of the most frustrating as the rain has once again caught up with the sport.

Thankfully, the weather has been better at tracks throughout the schedule for much of the year. Hopefully that pattern returns for the final stretch of the season so we don't have to sit through more nights like Sunday.