1997 Daytona 500: Youngest winner ever

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- In addition to being a talented young driver, Jeff Gordon proved to be a prophet.

With Rick Hendrick back home in North Carolina, fighting a battle with leukemia, Gordon promised the team owner he'd try to bring home a Daytona 500 trophy.

In fact, he did better than that. In addition to becoming the youngest driver ever to win the 500, Gordon led a 1-2-3 Hendrick sweep, getting congratulations from his boss via cell phone in Victory Lane.

	Jeff Gordon Credit: Autostock

"Jeff told me last night, 'I'm gonna win this race. I'm gonna make you smile tomorrow.' And he did," Hendrick said.

A veritable babe in a field that included 27 drivers older than 35, 16 at least 40, the 25-year-old Gordon made sure youth would be served on this day.

"I want to be in this sport a long time," Gordon said. "So I don't pay much attention to age. I just know it's gonna hurt someday when the young guys start passing me."

Dale Earnhardt and Bill Elliott certainly knew that feeling first-hand.

Gordon's pass of Earnhardt for second place with 10 laps to go set in motion a huge crash that left Earnhardt's car a mangled mess.

Gordon dove low in Turn 2, taking the air off Earnhardt's spoiler. The No. 3 Chevrolet bounced off Gordon's No. 24 Chevy, hit the wall, was struck by Dale Jarrett, then became airborne, flipping over Ernie Irvan and into the infield.

"Gordon came up on me and the car pushed off the corner," Earnhardt said.

"What I did didn't cause him to wreck," Gordon retorted. "When I did caused him to lift off the gas."

Earnhardt's heavily damaged car rolled back on its wheels before coming to a stop and he was able to climb out unaided. He went to a waiting ambulance, then changed his mind, instead climbing back into the car to the cheers of the crowd. He was able to finish the race in 31st place, five laps down.

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"I looked over there and said, 'Man, the wheels ain't knocked off that car yet,'" Earnhardt said. "I went over there, looked at the wheels and told the guy in the car to fire it up.

"It fired up, I told the guy to get out, then told the ambulance guy to unhook me. I've got to go.

"We took off after them. You've got to get all the laps you can. That's what we're running the championship for."

Gordon then made a daring pass for the lead on the restart, ducking dangerously close to the apron of the track to get around Elliott, with a little help from teammates Terry Labonte and Ricky Craven.

"He was tough to pass, but we were working him over pretty hard," Gordon said.

Even then, the race wasn't decided until a 12-car pileup on lap 197 which wiped out Jarrett and caused the race to end under caution. Despite getting caught up in the melee, Labonte was able to continue to finish second, with Craven third.

"I'm pretty amazed that it held up," Labonte said. "It really shouldn't have finished as good as it did."

Until the last two accidents, attrition was not a factor. There were more than 30 cars still on the track at the finish, 23 of those on the lead lap.

That included rookie pole-sitter Mike Skinner, who finished 12th, who was still disappointed with the effort.

"We took a first-place car and finished 12th with it," he said.

This is one in a series of articles counting down to the 2003 Daytona 500.