The 1991 Budweiser 500 was the 11th stock car race of the 1991 NASCAR Winston Cup Series and the 23rd iteration of the event. The race was held on Sunday, May 31, 1991, before an audience of 77,000 in Dover, Delaware at Dover Downs International Speedway, a 1-mile (1.6 km) permanent oval-shaped racetrack. The race took the scheduled 500 laps to complete. At race's end, Hendrick Motorsports driver Ken Schrader, after making a late-race pass for the lead with 78 laps to go in the race, would manage to hold onto the lead for the rest of the race to take his fourth and to date, final career NASCAR Winston Cup Series victory and his second and final victory of the season.[1][2][3] To fill out the top three, Richard Childress Racing driver Dale Earnhardt and Leo Jackson Motorsports driver Harry Gant would finish second and third, respectively.
Background
Dover Downs International Speedway is an oval race track in Dover, Delaware, United States that has held at least two NASCAR races since it opened in 1969. In addition to NASCAR, the track also hosted USAC and the NTT IndyCar Series. The track features one layout, a 1-mile (1.6 km) concrete oval, with 24° banking in the turns and 9° banking on the straights. The speedway is owned and operated by Dover Motorsports.
The track, nicknamed "The Monster Mile", was built in 1969 by Melvin Joseph of Melvin L. Joseph Construction Company, Inc., with an asphalt surface, but was replaced with concrete in 1995. Six years later in 2001, the track's capacity moved to 135,000 seats, making the track have the largest capacity of sports venue in the mid-Atlantic. In 2002, the name changed to Dover International Speedway from Dover Downs International Speedway after Dover Downs Gaming and Entertainment split, making Dover Motorsports. From 2007 to 2009, the speedway worked on an improvement project called "The Monster Makeover", which expanded facilities at the track and beautified the track. After the 2014 season, the track's capacity was reduced to 95,500 seats.
Entry list
- (R) denotes rookie driver.
Qualifying
Qualifying was split into two rounds. The first round was held on Friday, May 31, at 3:00 PM EST. Each driver would have one lap to set a time. During the first round, the top 20 drivers in the round would be guaranteed a starting spot in the race. If a driver was not able to guarantee a spot in the first round, they had the option to scrub their time from the first round and try and run a faster lap time in a second round qualifying run, held on Saturday, June 1, at 11:30 AM EST. As with the first round, each driver would have one lap to set a time. For this specific race, positions 21-40 would be decided on time,[4] and depending on who needed it, a select amount of positions were given to cars who had not otherwise qualified but were high enough in owner's points; up to two provisionals were given. If needed, a past champion who did not qualify on either time or provisionals could use a champion's provisional, adding one more spot to the field.
Michael Waltrip, driving for Bahari Racing, would win the pole, setting a time of 25.106 and an average speed of 143.392 miles per hour (230.767 km/h) in the first round.[5][6]
Billy Fulcher was the only driver to fail to qualify after his qualifying speed was determined to be too slow to run the race.
Full qualifying results
Race results
Standings after the race
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References
- ^ Higgins, Tom (June 3, 1991). "Schrader moves up a spot, gets victory at Dover (Part 1)". The Charlotte Observer. p. 21. Retrieved February 16, 2023 – via Newspapers.com.
- ^ Higgins, Tom (June 3, 1991). "Schrader moves up a spot, gets victory at Dover (Part 2)". The Charlotte Observer. p. 25. Retrieved February 16, 2023 – via Newspapers.com.
- ^ Owen, Mike (June 3, 1991). "Dover Doesn't Owe Schrader Anything After Good Six Years". The Scranton Times-Tribune. p. 19. Retrieved February 16, 2023.
- ^ "NASCAR today". The Charlotte Observer. May 31, 1991. p. 42. Retrieved February 16, 2023 – via Newspapers.com.
- ^ Higgins, Tom (June 1, 1991). "A pole, at long last (Part 1)". The Charlotte Observer. p. 25. Retrieved February 16, 2023 – via Newspapers.com.
- ^ Higgins, Tom (June 1, 1991). "A pole, at long last (Part 2)". The Charlotte Observer. p. 29. Retrieved February 16, 2023 – via Newspapers.com.