[media-credit name=”CIA Stock Photography, Inc.” align=”alignright” width=”274″][/media-credit]Robby Gordon worked hard to earn his way into Sunday’s 54th annual Daytona 500 but upon further review he says he might have worked too hard.

Gordon overcame a smoking right front in Thursday’s first Gatorade Duel race to finish ninth in his No. 7 Mapei / Menards / Speed Energy Dodge to lock into Sunday’s race. He’ll start the Daytona 500 from the 17th position.

“Making the Daytona 500 is the big event for NASCAR racing,” said Gordon afterwards.

“When you look at it, besides pure speed, I think three guys make it on speed, obviously Terry [Labonte] takes a past champion, which I still disagree with that, I think that should be based if you were with that team when you won the championship, not because you won the championship you’re in.

“That takes a spot from teams that are working hard to get into the Daytona 500. Rules are rules. We made it fair and square to be fast enough. Proud of my guys, proud of the team, excited to be in the Daytona 500.”

What Gordon was eluding to was the fact that NASCAR allows drivers who are past champions, such as Bill Elliott or Terry Labonte, to become automatically locked into a race because those accomplishments. What it does though it takes up spots from other drivers looking to make their way into the race, such as Gordon was on Thursday.

Elliott won the Sprint Cup Series championship in 1988 and Labonte in 1984 and 1996. Neither driver runs a full NASCAR schedule and neither were locked into the Daytona 500 entering Speedweeks. And neither qualified on their speed from last Sunday’s qualifying session.

While Elliott failed to race his way into the big race, Labonte only completed 12 laps in his No. 32 C&J Energy Dodge for FAS Lane Racing before heading to the garage. The plan was to keep the car in one piece before attempting to race all day on Sunday.

With Labonte parked it left Gordon and his small team fighting for their lives. Unlike Labonte, Gordon and company race nearly every weekend although they were unable to remain in the top 35 in points at the end of the 2011 season. Had they, Gordon wouldn’t have had to race his way in on Thursday.

“It’s crazy that you can actually finish seventh I the 150s, which would put you 14^th on the grid, you load your stuff up and go back to North Carolina,” said Gordon.

“I’ve been in that position and I get it. I’m not complaining about the rules. It’s really tough these days to get in. That’s the point I was trying to make, not so much Terry Labonte, 32 car. I don’t really care about them. I focus on our 7 car. Just try to do the best we can and win the Daytona 500, so I’m really proud of my guys.”

Plenty of reason to be, Gordon only has a company of about 10 employees, only about seven or eight of which built the car he raced into the Daytona 500. But watching others find a way to circumvent the rules can be irritating.

“Obviously I got a lot of respect for Terry, this is not a Terry Labonte thing,” said Gordon. “There’s only eight cars that make the Daytona 500. He takes one of those spots, now seven guys make the Daytona 500, four make it on qualifying races, three make it on speed. We’re a small team, too. I guess I should hire Kurt Busch and I could put my other car in the show too.

“It’s just not right. Why take a free ride when the rest of us have to bust our butts to get into the 500? It is what it is. It’s the rules. Like I said, we don’t make the rules, we just play by them, and sometimes you can manipulate them.”

[media-credit id=22 align=”alignright” width=”163″][/media-credit]Robby Gordon and Michael McDowell both arrived in Daytona with big dreams, those of not winning the Daytona 500 but just making it into the field.

In order to do so the two with their little teams needed a lot of help. Neither was fast enough to qualify on time for Sunday’s race meaning they had to race their way in on Thursday afternoon in the Gatorade Duels and it wouldn’t be easy.

Gordon didn’t make it half a lap before trouble found him. The right front of his No. 7 Mapei / Menards / Speed Energy Dodge started smoking from an apparent fender rub. Rather than pit Gordon nursed the car until the first caution came out on lap eight.

“Well, what it was it looked like when they changed the oil, we changed obviously between qualifying and racing, and when they changed the oil the bottom of the radiator trays gets a lot of seepage of oil into the foam,” Gordon said.

“As we went at speed, we were running hot yesterday in practice, so we changed it last night and added some oil to it, changed the weight of the oil. It was in that tray. It was splashing up onto the motor. I’m like, ‘Oh, man, this thing is going to blow up.’ It kind of played into my hand because when the race started, I didn’t know if I should go balls to the wall and make sure we run at the front, take a chance of being in one of those wrecks, or be around for the last dance.”

Thankfully the rest of the race would be uneventful for Gordon, who says that every time he comes to plate races he ends up with a great shot to be there at the end. The same happened on Thursday when he came back to finish ninth and lock himself into Sunday’s big race. It’s a big deals says Gordon.

“We were in a position last year, kind of sounds crazy, but I’ve won IndyCar races, we’ve won NASCAR races, we were in a position, we didn’t have funding to race all the races,” he said.

“We found ourselves outside the top 35. Making the Daytona 500 is the big event for NASCAR acing. When you look at it, besides pure speed, I think three guys making it on speed, obviously Terry [Labonte] takes a past champion, which I still disagree with that, I think that should be based if you were with that team when you won the championship, not because you won the championship you’re in. That takes a spot from teams that are working really hard to get into the Daytona 500.”

But says Gordon, “Rules are rules. We made it fair and square to be fast enough. Proud of the guys, proud of the team, excited to be in the Daytona 500.”

The same goes for McDowell. His No. 98 K-Love/ Curb Records Ford didn’t have smoke trailing from it but he did find himself near trouble. The first caution that took out Juan Pablo Montoya, Paul Menard and David Gilliland came with a front row seat for McDowell, who believes he might have caused it and left him with damage to his hood.

“I was right in it,” he said. “I’ll have to watch the replay. I feel I was the cause of it really. Trevor [Bayne] was on my bumper there pushing me, I got to David’s bumper, as soon as I did, it turned hard left.”

McDowell then explained, “You just never know with this new style of the tandem and the spoiler, Trevor yesterday pushed me around for three solid laps. The car never moved, never wiggled. When I go to David’s bumper, I feel it was going to be the same for him. Obviously it wasn’t. I know it’s very unfortunate for him. I know they were locked in, didn’t plan on racing a whole lot, just wanted to feel out their car.”

At the time McDowell thought he was going home. When the car turned left and right he imagined himself being involved in the wreck, only to end up keep going. He believes that having faith and knowing God was in control saved his race and he won’t take it for granted.

And he won’t take Bayne for granted either. He was the driver that worked the most with McDowell, helping his friend race his way into the event. Bayne is the defending race winner and would end up locking himself in the event from his qualifying speed. Thursday he played wingman to McDowell who finished sixth.

“It’s absolutely the reason I’m in the 500,” he said. “There’s no doubt about it. Trevor’s obviously a close friend of mine. For him to take the unselfish route and help me out, it means a lot to me. There’s been a lot of ups and downs for him in his career as well. It’s just cool we’ve been able to kind of go through those together. For him to push me into the 500 is definitely pretty special.”

Now both Gordon and McDowell with take their teams of less than 10 individuals into the season’s biggest event. According to McDowell his Phil Parsons Racing team has six guys that built his car during the off-season. Now after making the Daytona they hope it will lead to building on the team and bring in more partners and sponsors.

“You guys probably don’t know much, but a lot of these small teams work together,” said McDowell. We don’t have the resources. We have six guys at the shop, if we need something we can go over to Robby’s [Gordon] and borrow it. And JTG pitted my car today. It’s cool to see. This community has changed over the last few years in the sense that there’s not an abundance of people, an abundance of funds, an abundance of parts. It’s fun to see everybody working together.”

Gordon says counting those who do the marketing, decals, merchandise and even the receptionist there’s about 10 people in his shop that end up doing a lot of different jobs.

“We’re down to seven or eight guys now, too,” said Gordon about those who work on his cars. “It’s not that there’s good guys out there. It’s the fact there’s no sponsors out there. Without sponsors, you can’t hire people. We’re in a bad state right here. It’s tough. It’s really, really, really tough. We don’t have anybody on the hook.”