DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- Jamie McMurray was the piece that didn't fit anymore at Roush Fenway Racing, so off he went looking for a job.
He landed back where his Sprint Cup career began, with owner Chip Ganassi at Earnhardt Ganassi Racing. And in his first race back, he landed in Victory Lane, using a mad dash in a green-white-checkered finish to end an otherwise forgettable day for NASCAR with a memorable finish and even more memorable aftermath in the Daytona 500.
"It's unreal," McMurray said, sobbing. "To be where I was last year and for [Earnhardt Ganassi] to take a chance and let me come back means a lot to me. What a way to pay them back."
McMurray led once for just two laps, a record low for the race. He was the last of a record 21 leaders. Fifty-two lead changes were third-most all-time in the race.
Ironically, it was a push from a friend and former teammate that helped him squirt past and hold off Richard Childress Racing's Kevin Harvick and Clint Bowyer on the second attempt at a green-white-checkered finish. Greg Biffle pushed McMurray and kept his No. 1 Chevrolet steady through Turn 1 and again on the backstretch when McMurray spun his tires, then held on to finish third.
"I was trying to get both of us out front so I could try to make a move on him on the last lap," Biffle said. "I just made my move too soon."
Dale Earnhardt Jr. blitzed through the field from 10th to finish second, .119 seconds behind.
"When I saw [Earnhardt Jr.] behind me, I said, 'Oh, no,' " said McMurray, who lost his place at Roush Fenway when the team had to downsize to four teams to comply with NASCAR rules.
Earnhardt Jr. was at the same time eager to pass for a second Daytona 500 and happy that a driver for a team with direct lineage to the one his late father founded was about to win the sport's biggest race.
"I was happy for him. He's been through a lot," he said. "That team has been through a lot."
An odd Speed Weeks culminated with Sprint Cup finally becoming the primary focus and then a target of scrutiny and scorn.
While the first 11 days were defined by Danica Patrick's emergence as a ready-made NASCAR star - and a serviceable work in progress as a Nationwide Series driver - the last was about the most prestigious race of the NASCAR season.
Her absence made room for old racing heroes and country music acts and politicians injecting themselves into the festivities, but also a realization that the season could be another challenging one.
NASCAR tweaked rules and announced a recommitment to its burlier past to stoke a fan base that watched less on television and at racetracks last season. Grandstands were mostly filled - DIS reported all "single-day" tickets sold - after capacity was reduced by 22,000 seats this offseason, but the effects of a flat economy were still evident in the scores of open RV spots.
Those grandstands bled patrons after a first 100-minute repair delay and lost even more as the day wore on and the value of an earlier 1 p.m. start time was lost. A second red-flag period to redo a failed fix lasted 44 minutes.
The race began with enough hope, with 19 leaders through the first 122 laps. Among them were crowd favorite Earnhardt Jr. and A.J. Allmendinger, driving the legendary No. 43 Richard Petty Motorsports entry that has not been to Victory Lane since 1999 at Martinsville with John Andretti.
But this race was consumed by a hole.
The race was red-flagged for 1 hour, 48 minutes on Lap 122 of 200 when a hole some drivers described as 18 inches long and 8 inches wide was discovered between Turns 1 and 2 after Andretti crashed into the wall to draw a caution. Bowyer led, followed by David Ragan and Kasey Kahne, as crews began patching two spots.
The first 50 laps passed uneventfully except for a blown right rear tire that sent Brad Keselowski - a restrictor-plate race winner at Talladega last spring - to the garage with Penske teammate Sam Hornish Jr. and others caught in the aftermath.
Fresh tires became a commodity as several of the early challengers, among them Earnhardt Jr. and Juan Pablo Montoya, struggled at the end of pit cycles on the warmest day of Speed Weeks.
After a green-flag pit cycle that concluded on Lap 50, Kurt Busch - a three-time Daytona 500 runner-up, Allmendinger - who finished a surprising third last season - and 2006 winner Jimmie Johnson broke a dozen car lengths ahead of the field.
The pace increased markedly after the delay - much like last season when rain was imminent - and word began filtering among drivers and spotters that the first fix was not holding.
Kevin Harvick led after the second delay and held the lead seven times for 41 laps. Bowyer led eight times for 37 laps.
