Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, August 29, 1993 TAG: 9308290271
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: E1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: BOB ZELLER STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: BRISTOL, TENN. LENGTH: Medium
Martin muscled past Wallace in the third and fourth turns on lap 488 and then had to battle in heavy traffic to keep Wallace from passing him before taking the checkered flag by one car length.
Dale Earnhardt never led, but stayed out of trouble to finish third and retain his stranglehold on the Winston Cup championship points lead. Harry Gant was fourth, followed by Rick Mast, who had his best finish of the year.
Martin's third straight victory was particularly impressive because he battled back after losing two laps early in the race with a vibrating right rear wheel. And he won this race from the pole, which he captured Saturday afternoon with a lap speed of 121.405 mph.
Martin pushed his Ford Thunderbird so hard that the front right brake rotor caught fire in victory lane. There were no fire extinguishers there, so his crew had to put it out with Gatorade while Martin staggered away from the smoke.
"We were lucky tonight," Martin said. "We missed all the wrecks and managed to stay ahead of Rusty, even though Geoff [Bodine] was holding us up at the end."
To show his displeasure, Martin gave Bodine a tap after the race was over.
"We got too far behind and I got pretty tired, but we pulled it off," Martin said. "Rusty didn't give me much room."
Said Wallace, "I started getting a little tired at the end. My neck started hurting. He got me."
Bristol is a lot better at dishing out disappointment than happiness, and Ricky Rudd, Kyle Petty, Bobby Labonte and Lake Speed were among those with the worst experiences.
Rudd was in third place for most of the first 350 laps and appeared headed for a strong finish when his orange Chevy suddenly spun coming off turn 2 and slammed head-on into the inside wall.
"Evidently I got up just a little too high coming out of turn 2 and around we went," Rudd said. His crew repaired the car, but he was 85 laps down when he got back on the track.
Kyle Petty, who started 20th, clawed his way through the field and into the lead on lap 156. He led 23 laps before relinquishing to Wallace.
Then, on lap 196, Petty's car got loose coming out of turn 4, fishtailed down the frontstretch and spun, slamming the end of the pit wall. That was it for Petty, who said he just lost it.
Labonte, who has been coming on strong during the second half of his rookie season, was hanging on to the lead lap when his car suddenly spun coming off turn 2 on lap 310.
"The odor was getting to me," Labonte told his crew on the radio.
"Be calm, be calm," crew chief Tim Brewer told him. Brewer then ordered other crew members to find Terry Labonte, Bobby's brother, for relief duty.
"Tell them to hurry up because that's the reason I spun out," Labonte said. "My stomach is about to blow up."
Labonte lost no laps after the spin, but he went three laps down during the next caution period while the change in drivers was made.
Speed was in the top 10 until lap 430, when he was tapped by Mast and hit the wall in turn 2.
The demanding track took its toll on other drivers, too, as Jimmy Hensley and Geoff Bodine complained of leg cramps late in the race while running in the top 10.
The inevitable process of winnowing the field at Bristol started on lap 10, when Ernie Irvan spun down the backstretch and tapped the inside wall. Irvan lost a lap and never was a factor.
Earlier, during qualifying, Irvan crashed in turn 4, forcing him to go to a backup car and use a provisional starting spot.
Dale Jarrett was the other driver on an all-star, provisional back row. He failed to qualify for one of the 32 starting positions after crashing in practice Friday. His qualifying lap Saturday was his fastest of the day, but it still was too slow.
The biggest crash of the evening occurred shortly after the race started, when eight cars tangled in turn 1 on lap 31.
Bobby Hamilton spun after being tapped by Sterling Marlin, and as they plowed into the outside wall, Jimmy Spencer, Terry Labonte and Darrell Waltrip piled in behind them. Spencer's car became airborne as it climbed over Labonte's car.
Keywords:
AUTO RACING
by CNB