Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, September 20, 1993 TAG: 9309200055
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: DOVER, DEL. LENGTH: Medium
\ Rusty Wallace warned everybody he would be there when the NASCAR Winston Cup championship was decided. He is delivering.
Wallace came from two laps down Sunday to claim his second consecutive victory and seventh of the season in the SplitFire Spark Plug 500 at Dover Downs International Speedway.
His winning speed of 100.334 mph replaced David Pearson's 1975 mark of 100.820 as the slowest to win a 500-mile Winston Cup race on Dover's mile high- Finish, points standings in Scoreboard. B4 banked oval. It cut Dale Earnhardt's season points lead from 284 to 181 and was worth $77,645 - $22,800 as a bonus for winning from the pole.
Wallace has six races left to overtake Earnhardt, who finished 27th after suffering major damage in a multicar crash.
"I was close enough to make it a point race going into this thing," the 1989 Winston Cup champion said after his half-second victory over Ken Schrader. "I'm going to be relentless. I'm just going to drive my guts out."
Wallace left with the 28th victory of his career, his first ever at Dover. He also left bad feelings among some drivers after starting the wreck that ruined Earnhardt's day when the five-time champion was running second.
"This is a big-boy sport," said Wallace, who has had two horrifying crashes this year. "I didn't get upset when I went end over end 16 times at Talladega."
After Sunday's crash, Wallace made up the second lap of his deficit and went on to beat Schrader and Darrell Waltrip in a 21-lap sprint from the record 16th caution of the day.
Behind Wallace's Pontiac and the Chevrolets of Schrader and Waltrip, Dale Jarrett finished fourth and Harry Gant fifth, also in Chevys.
The 16 cautions surpassed the former track record of 14 during the September 1988 and June 1993 races.
Tire problems led NASCAR officials to order three caution periods for tire checks, the last of which set up the final sprint among Wallace, Schrader and Waltrip.
The key event of the day came on lap 370, off a restart with Wallace trying to regain the second of two laps he lost when he slowed on lap 284 with a tire problem.
Starting behind Hut Stricklin, Wallace hit Stricklin in the left rear, sending Stricklin's Ford into Earnhardt and Ricky Rudd, who was running third.
Wallace speculated that Stricklin might have missed a gear.
"I mashed the gas and took off," Wallace said. "When I took off, the boy [Stricklin] didn't go."
Stricklin said he did not miss a shift, but that Wallace hit him while he was shifting.
"Rusty just got overanxious," Stricklin said. "I mean, so anxious that he hit me before I had a chance to get to third gear."
Earnhardt also blamed Wallace.
"I don't know what Rusty was thinking," Earnhardt said.
Earnhardt, Stricklin and Rudd were among five cars that sustained heavy damage in the incident.
Keywords:
AUTO RACING
by CNB