DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- By the end of Speedweeks, former Winston Cup champion Rusty Wallace hopes to add a couple more optional titles before his name:

Daytona 500 winner and bartender.

	Veteran Rusty Wallace is tired of watching other drivers pull into Victory Lane at Daytona.

Wallace is one of the biggest names in NASCAR not to have won the Daytona 500, but he's intent on erasing that distinction. So, along with an offseason-long preparation regimen that included daily visits to the race shop, Wallace is turning to the beer Gods for assistance.

If he wins the main event, everybody in attendance above the legal drinking age will get a free six-pack of Miller Lite -- the brand which sponsors Wallace's No. 2 Dodge.

And though the announcement was met with jest by his peers -- Mark Martin, sponsored by Viagra, joked that if he ran a similar deal there would be a lot of doctor visits to follow -- Wallace says he's just trying everything he can to cross this item off his racing to-do list.

"People ask, 'Would you rather win the championship or the Daytona 500?' Well, I have to think about that one hard," Wallace said. "I want to win another title, but I've already won one. I've never won the Daytona 500. That would be a big feather in my cap to win the race.

"I think I'd rather win the doggone Daytona 500 rather than the championship even though the championship pays a lot of money. I'll probably wake up tomorrow morning and change my mind on that decision, but the Daytona 500 is such a special race."

When asked the next morning, Wallace's mind, in fact, did not change.

"It would bug me if one of these days when I quit driving if I haven't won (the Daytona 500) at all," he said. "That would bug me. I feel like it's my time to win, I really do. I think I'm deserving of it. I think I'd make a good 500 champion."

The 19-year veteran has won 54 races and the 1989 title. His winless season last year snapped a streak of winning at least one race in 16 straight seasons. But, his racing resume will not be complete without a 500 victory.

He thinks 2003 could be his year.

"I feel real good about my shot this year, but I'll guarantee you everybody is going to say the same thing," Wallace said. "... Testing went real good, and the engines and the cars look fantastic. I've learned to quit being so bold with my statements going into Daytona. I'm a little more reserved, but I'm real confident going into it."

Then, again, that's the way Wallace has always been going into Speedweeks for the last 20 years (he competed in one Daytona 500 before he was a full-time driver).

"Absolutely, (and) I think that's what Dale Earnhardt did every single year," Wallace said, referring to the late seven-time champion who, despite being the winningest driver at Daytona, went 19 tries before winning the big one. "He went down there before he won the race. He kept beating on it, and he had a bunch of highs and lows like I did.

"I remember Earnhardt leading the race going into Turn 3 and the tire blows. I remember me leading the 500 with 10 laps to go and getting passed. I remember a lot of close calls in the 500. The year he won the 500 in 1998, I thought I was going to win that race. A caution flag came out, we pitted, he beat us out and he won. I've had a lot of close calls, but you've just got to keep beating on it until you get it."

Wallace's closest call was in 1999, when he was leading with the race waning.

	“	I feel real good about my shot this year, but I'll guarantee you everybody is going to say the same thing. ”
		— Rusty Wallace

"I was leading with 12 laps to go. The caution flag came out and we had a restart," Wallace said. "Jeremy (Mayfield) was my teammate. He was right on my bumper, and his handling went away and he fell back. (Jeff) Gordon got past him and we were drafting along. Gordon gets underneath me on the tri-oval and gets down on the apron and we have this big race going into Turn 1.

"Ricky Rudd got the car tore up going into (Turn) 1, and I had him down on the apron. Somebody had to get out of the gas to keep from causing one hell of a wreck, and I lost the race right there. That was a race I remember. Looking back on it right now, I should have just stayed on the throttle, stayed on the bottom and forced him to make some type of maneuver. Anyway, that was a frustrating race to lose. I thought I had the Daytona 500 won there."

This year, winning the Daytona 500 will be only one challenge in the first race of the year. This year, Penske South Racing -- which includes Wallace and last year's top rookie Ryan Newman -- made the switch from Ford to Dodge.

Of course, Wallace has made switches before -- he won the title in a Pontiac in 1989 and switched to Ford five years later -- so he believes the transition will be minimal.

"I don't think there's going to be any learning curve," he said. "The power is already there. We feel like the reliability is already there. Now we're just going to have to go to the racetrack and alter the springs and shocks to accommodate this new body."

Anyway, he likes the idea of a new start for the season. Last year's winless campaign was hurtful, he said, so he's coming back with renewed vigor in 2003.

"I compare this to to my '92 season when I ran good all year long but had a bunch of failures," he said. "I'll never forget in '92 when Earnhardt and I were sitting in the back room. He was 12th and I was 13th (in standings). They started the banquet and he left. The very next year, we were so upset that I came out and won 10 races and he won six or seven. He won the championship, and I finished second, so we both had a good year.

"You're digging down deep to find all you can, and then you find a little bit more."

Rupen Fofaria is a beat writer for The Raleigh News & Observer and a regular contributor to ESPN.com.