Edwards proves pundits wrong; Sports media pick driver for first; he finishes last.(Sports) - Albany Times Union (Albany, NY)

Byline: JAY HART The (Allentown, Pa.) Morning Call

Carl Edwards, the driver Sports Illustrated, The Sporting News and ESPN The Magazine picked to win this year's title, finished dead last, but he wasn't the only big name to run into trouble.

Jeff Gordon (26th), Greg Biffle (31st) and Kurt Busch (38th) all found trouble in a race with 11 cautions.

'Guys just started getting anxious out there,' said Gordon, who won this race a year ago. 'I was a little bit anxious out there. I feel our deal could have been avoided - a lot of them could have been avoided.'

Edwards got the worst of it. His day ended on Lap 79 after Jeff Green got turned around. Kyle Petty slowed to avoid the wreck when Edwards slammed in the back of Petty.

'I should have been more worried about stopping my car than people from behind running into me, and I ended up being that guy that got Kyle,' said Edwards, who won four races last year, his first full season of Nextel Cup racing.

Gordon's day turned long when he traded paint with Tony Stewart less than 50 laps into the race.

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Some cheaters suffer: Last week, post-qualifying inspections found the No. 96 car to have an unapproved modification to the carburetor, thus disqualifying Terry Labonte's qualifying time. When asked about the incident, Troy Aikman, who along with Roger Staubach, owns the No. 96 car, said, 'There's a part of me that feels like we've caught up to this sport pretty quickly.'

Labonte, who qualified for the race as a past champion, finished 17th.

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Rookies' year: Clint Bowyer finished tops among the seven rookies in the field. Boyer wound up sixth. Martin Truex Jr. was next-best at 16th.

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Help for driver: Kirk Shelmerdine, who crew-chiefed for the late Dale Earnhardt in the 1980s, is a one-man team with no sponsor, no pit crew and no money for tires. He didn't find a sponsor, but he did find a pit crew and received a donation for the tires from a random family in the infield.

Earnhardt's former boss, Richard Childress, flew Shelmerdine's son, who had never been to Daytona, on his private plane. In turn, Shelmerdine put Childress Vineyard on the hood of his car.

Shelmerdine not only finished on the lead lap, but wound up 20th.

'We couldn't keep up with the other cars, but I guess we beat all the wrecked ones,' he said.

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Celebs in the house: Bon Jovi performed a three-song concert prior to the race. They were joined on stage by Jennifer Nettles of Sugarland. Fergie from the Blackeyed Peas sang the national anthem. Others celebrity sightings included Roger Clemens, Kid Rock in a Tony Stewart jersey, snowboarding gold medalist Hannah Teter and silver medalist Gretchen Bleiler, Kansas City Chiefs tight end Tony Gonzalez, Chipper Jones and Marcus Giles of the Atlanta Braves and actor James Caan, the Grand Marshal.

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