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If the expression holds true that everybody loves an underdog, race fans should be smitten with the results of the country’s biggest auto races this year.

Trevor Bayne shocked the motorsports world with his Daytona 500 win. The race was only his second career NASCAR Cup start and he did it from behind the wheel of the famed Wood Brothers entry. The Wood family has fielded a NASCAR team for generations and is highly revered. However, their most recent circuit victory was in 2001. When the Great American Race began the red and white number 21 was not high on the oddsmakers' list.

The Southern 500 run on Mother’s Day weekend on the tour’s oldest superspeedway was claimed by young Regan Smith for his first career Cup win. The Darlington Raceway has tremendous significance in NASCAR's history and the race ranks in the top five in prestige on the circuit.

My daughter Colleen loves the Disney princess movies. All of them. The ones that were made well before she was born, and even the ones made well before I was born. The time-tested Cinderella is a favorite to my 5-year-old.

The premise is similar among all of the animated films. Young attractive female meets young, attractive male and they are attracted to one another. Some villain or obstacle gets in the way, but is overcome leaving them with a lesson learned. The story ends with our two heroes together and “happily ever after.”

Daytona produced a few underdog heroes. Their “ever after” began when the 500’s checkered flag waved. Disney rarely produces a film that follows up on the prince and princess’s lives after they embrace and ride off in their carriage. But we do get to see our Speedweeks Cinderellas after the symbolic sunset walk.

Chapter two is called Phoenix. Chapter three is called Las Vegas. Chapter four is called Bristol, and so on.

“Now there’s the kid to watch. This kid Earnhardt.” CBS anchor Ken Squier uttered that great line during his call of the 1979 Daytona 500. I would say Squier was correct.

Dale Earnhardt’s extremely successful career had a chapter all of its own about his struggles to win the Daytona 500. The story grew in stature year after year not only because of the close-but-no-cigar finishes in the 500, but because of his excellence in NASCAR at winning everything else.

That 1979 race in Earnhardt’s rookie season ended with him in fourth place. Little did any of us know a Hall of Fame career was underway.

If you could be a NASCAR Cup driver this year would you rather be Clint Bowyer or Jamie McMurray? Think about that.

McMurray’s 2010 record is too inconsistent to challenge for the Championship. But he has visited the Winner’s Circle on a pair of occasions. And they were huge events.

He paced the field to the checkered flag in the biggest stock car race in the world. Last February on a chilly Sunday evening, McMurray crossed the finish line first in the Daytona 500. Bringing about an effusive response from the pit crew and literal tears from the driver in post race interviews. There are some sports fans that watch just one single race all year. And McMurray won it.

INDIANAPOLIS _ Chip Ganassi celebrated in victory lane at the Indianapolis 500 completing an auto racing double dip that no car owner had ever accomplished. In February Ganassi hoisted the Daytona 500 trophy with NASCAR driver Jamie McMurray. And four months later he shared a sip of victory milk with Indycar driver Dario Franchitti. This gave Ganassi a first for an auto racing team owner, victories in the Daytona 500 and Indy 500 in the same year.

Franchitti dominated the action at Indianapolis leading 155 of 200 laps but the win was in doubt until the race’s final moments. His last pit stop was completed with 37 laps remaining, on the outer edge of the team’s fuel window.