Where would NASCAR be with out another fantastic Daytona mishap?
Last Saturday was the start of the 2014 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series with the Sprint Unlimited, a 75 lap non-points event that’s seen as the pre-season race for the Daytona 500. It offers a unique racing format, in that the 75 laps are split up into three segments, with fans deciding the distribution of laps for the final segment: 10, 15, or 20 laps with the middle segment taking up the difference; along with fans voting for the starting order and restarting order for the final shoot out segment.
18 cars started, and by caution on Lap 55, only 8 remained due to a nightmarish (or excellent, depending on your expectations of NASCAR) crash-filled race.
Not even the Chevrolet SS pace car could escape the drama, when its auxiliary electrical system for the caution lights apparently caught fire in the trunk.
Not that Chevrolet has had the smoothest product launch for the SS, but their $43,000 SS sedan burning on live television doesn’t help, especially on the heels of a recall of 370,000 2014 Chevrolet and GMC pickups over fire concerns.
The pace car was driven by former Sprint Cup driver Brett Bodine. Bodine quickly pulled the SS off course and drove to the nearest safety truck, which met him trackside.
Chevrolet issued a statement Sunday morning about the ordeal, blaming it on the auxilary electronics housed in the truck of the SS for the caution lights, and other electronics stuff into the pace car.
“The pace car experienced a fire in the trunk area, which contains a purpose-built auxiliary electrical kit to operate the numerous caution lights during the race,” Chevrolet said in a statement. “The pace car driver and passenger safely exited the vehicle. An assessment is underway.”
Finally, a shout out to Daytona Speedway safety worker and Jalopnik commenter, “Nic” for speaking up on the fire and confirming Chevrolets statement:
“It was due to the strobe lights batteries in the trunk… just going off what I saw inside the trunk while it was on fire. We had to disconnect the regular battery, located in the trunk as well on these cars but on the drivers side, it had no burn marks. There was 4 or 5 full size batteries in the trunk on the floor and a spare tire wedged in front of them as well.”
The 2014 Daytona Sprint Unlimited ended with Denny Hamlin in first, Brad Keselowski in second, and Kyle Busch in third.
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boogity boogity boogity
Six more days!! Lets go racing boys!
Oh Well the Holden pace car went up in flames. Marcos Ambrose ran into Dale Jr.
@RobertRyan
It looked more like Dale JR ran into the wall;)
Soon to be listed on eBay, no doubt.
“Never driven in rain, non-smoker, southern car, hot ride…”
Ha!
Special lap lineage!
Unfortunately for the people at General Motors, they are getting bad press for this…because the American public largely seems to be too ignorant to do the research and find out that the fire was indeed caused by the handiwork of NASCAR’s outfitters, and not GM.
Of course, that kind of ignorance is exacerbated by news outlets, who will make something look ten times worse than it is. You should have seen how gloomy our local news station was when they previewed their segment on the recent Toyota recall…
+1 Appears some folks here didn’t read the story prior to posting.
It was from the lack of a clutch.
In other news, Porsche is suspending deliveries of the GT3 because of their propensity to burst into flames. Non-factory modifications are not required for a flaming hot experience…
http://www.leftlanenews.com/porsche-suspending-911-gt3-deliveries-after-spate-of-fires.html
That’s why they say the car industry is red hot these days….
They used a holden as a pace car ? what did they expect? reliability?
Too risky to use the Camry…you know with the stuck accelerators and all. Drivers would’t be too kind to the pace car passing them at 140 on a caution lap.
Was it the “floor mats” that caused the fire in the SS, as well? Tee hee.
I missed the part that said Holden did the aftermarket electronics in the trunk.
Alicia Keys and Nicki Minaj made a song about the Daytona Pace Car back in 2012. The conspiracy theorists are right; Hollywood CAN predict the future!
Ford F-Series firetruck FTW!
Are we absolutely SURE that the “newly redesigned” Holden / Pontiac G8 is truly worthy of the SS name?
I just read an article where a Government Motors spokesperson very vaguely shared the “many differences” between the two. I dunno… I can’t push myself to drink that Kool-Aid. If it looks like a duck, and sounds like a duck…
Sure, sure… I’ve seen the specs. I’ve also seen that astronomical MSRP.
How many units are they planning to sell to the cash-strapped vanishing middle class?
“If it looks like a duck, and sounds like a duck…”
Catera.
SS = Shower of Sparks
Is this model the same as the PPV?
Yes and no. The Chevy Caprice PPV and the Chevy SS are fundamentally the same vehicle. They use two different bodies, but all of the sheet-metal before the B-pillars is identical between the two, and so are the major cabin pieces. The Caprice PPV comes standard with the ubiquitous 3.6-liter V6, with an optional 6.0-liter V8 (which was a Holden engine that the Pontiac G8 used for the GT trim ), while the SS exclusively uses the 6.2-liter LS3 V8 (which was the Corvette engine that the Pontiac G8 used for the GXP trim). The cars may or may not use the same transmission; I was too lazy to look it up. I guess you could consider Caprice PPV and the SS to be the same car, with different adaptations and different side-panels…
Of more relevance than a trunk fire caused by incompetents incompetently installing the strobe system, everybody I know gave up watching this sham racing in 2009 and 2010. Bullshit cautions, always with 5 laps to go so some shambler or another can magically gain 10 places somehow, all the delight and straightforwardness of some old time county fair where every carney game was rigged.
From what I see and read the fan base is shrinking, especially live spectators who get restless if the race runs too long and their beer runs out. It’s just some place to hang out for the weekend.
NASCAR has about run its course. The France family has squeezed all the real juice out of the fans. Plus they bought US Sports Car racing combining Rolex and ALMS and from what I read, managed to completely screw up the first race this year.
Vast intellect, known as greed, at work here.
Yep NASCRASH(TM) is the WWF of auto racing, I can’t stand it. The mere idea of “competition yellow” is insane. They actually stop the racing to let people catch up! The fact that cars are not “stock cars” has made the series easy to ignore for me. I realize as an F1 fan I might be calling the kettle black, but to me F1 is not about racing, its about the technology. I heard NASCRASH recently switched to fuel injection… impressive tech, for 1980.
I love this!
It would have looked nicer if the smoke was coming off the rear wheels!
Hmmmm. Is this car built in Mexico with all the 4 door Silverado’s ?
@Alsorl,
Elizabeth South Australia with the other Holden Commodores.
LWB Calais was the basis for the SS
http://images.drive.com.au/drive_images/Editorial/UserReviewImageUploads/Calais%20V%20Lowered%20270107A20070209170553.JPG