Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, October 24, 1993 TAG: 9310260321
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B11 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: M.J. DOUGHERTY STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: RADFORD LENGTH: Medium
The Winston-Salem, N.C., driver moved in front on lap 53 of the Late Model Stock portion of the Southwest Virginia Chevy Dealers 300 on Saturday. He stayed there without any serious challenge for the rest of the 250-lap race.
"It seems like the car would work real good on warm tires," Rumley said of his Chevrolet. "When it stayed green for a long time, it ran good."
Rumley's 28th victory at the track was worth $6,725 from the $27,125 purse.
Before Rumley took over, Grundy's Randy Ratliff led for 52 laps. Ratliff stayed right behind Rumley until a flat tire knocked him out of the race on lap 111.
"I believe we would have had something for him if we hadn't had that flat tire," Ratliff said. "When he [Rumley] came up on me, my father radioed that I should slide up, let him past and run behind him for a while. Everything was fine, but we must have picked up something during the caution [on laps 99-103]."
The pass for the lead completed Rumley's march through a very fast field. After starting seventh, he picked his way through traffic.
"The first two passes were harder than the last two - the 24 and the 15 [cars, Ratliff for the lead and Kelly Denton for second]," Rumley said. "They both seemed to be getting loose a little bit, and rather than holding me up or mirror driving, they let me by. That was good racing on their part, not holding up a faster car."
Ironically, the only competitor who came close to mounting a threat to Rumley was Denton. At the midpoint intermission, Denton sat second. And his car seemed to improve as the race progressed.
On lap 176, Denton put his car's nose to the inside and pulled alongside Rumley's car. But one lap later, Denton's water pump gave out.
"My car was getting better on the long runs," Denton said. "On the restarts, Johnny would pull us by about 10 car lengths. Then we had to wait for the tires to get hot. When I pulled up on him, I could see the blisters on his right rear tire. It was only a matter of time before I tried to get around him."
Mechanical problems also knocked out the winningest driver in track history. Christiansburg's Ronnie Thomas' car blew a head gasket on lap 89 while running eighth.
So with the cars most capable of giving him problems out of the race, Rumley only had to stay out of trouble to maintain his lead. He did that, keeping runner-up Stacy Compton of Hurt three to four seconds behind during the last 25 laps.
"I feel like if we could have caught him, we could have run with him," said Compton, who drove a Ford for the first time this season. "We were running identical lap times. But our car didn't handle as well up high, so lap traffic hurt us."
Only five other cars finished on the lead lap. They were driven by Paul Radford of Ferrum; Jeff Agnew of Floyd; Mike Skinner of Randleman, N.C.; Kenny Prillaman of Salem; and Mike Porter of Princeton, W.Va.
Completing the top 10 were three drivers whose cars finished one lap down: Junior Leagans of Max Meadows, Rodney "Six Pack" Cundiff of Boones Mill and Tony McGuire of Roanoke.
Rock Harris of Yadkinville, N.C., took the lead in the first turn and held it for all 50 laps of the Limited Sportsman race.
Because of the quick start, Harris avoided a first-lap spin involving pole-sitter Charlie Miles and third-place qualifier Mark Akers.
The rest of the top five were Paul Shull of Clintwood, Bo Howell of Christiansburg, Rick Cook of Tazewell and Bruce Brown of Rocky Mount.
The apparent second- and third-place finishers - Darrell Holman of Abingdon and Wes Adair of Yeager, W.Va. - were disqualified. Holman had an illegal intake. Adair refused to tear down his car for inspection. \
see microfilm for complete results.
Keywords:
AUTO RACING
by CNB