ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, April 22, 1996 TAG: 9604230173
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B-1 EDITION: METRO
COLUMN: Jack Bogaczyk
DATELINE: MARTINSVILLE
SOURCE: JACK BOGACZYK
Ernie Irvan started 34th on Sunday at Martinsville Speedway.
If he had started a record Winston Cup afternoon any farther back, the Texaco Ford driver would have been in the top row of the track's new bleacher section.
Irvan still is making a comeback from his serious crash in August 1994 at Michigan International Speedway, and if that wasn't evident in where he finished in the Goody's 500, it was obvious in where he went after the race.
Irvan spent more than a half-hour in the infield care center, hooked to an IV for what a doctor called ``slight dehydration.''
It wasn't much of a way to celebrate his best finish in his 11 Winston Cup races since more than 13 months away from the track.
While Rusty Wallace continued to bloom like the track-side azaleas - he rolled to his fourth consecutive spring Martinsville victory - Irvan finished 2.5 seconds back, in second. That gave Ford its first 1-2 finish of the NASCAR season.
Irvan's crew chief, Larry McReynolds, said the 18th second place of Irvan's career is a measure of where the driver had come from.
He meant hospitalization after what could have been career-ending injuries, as well as where the Texaco team has started most of the 1996 season.
``It's real important, what happened here today,'' McReynolds said. ``We just keep plugging away, and so does Ernie. The two places you don't want to start where we did are Bristol and Martinsville.
``When you're that far back on this short a track, you're in turn 3. You're seven or eight seconds down when you take the green flag.''
Or, as one other member of the Robert Yates' pit crew said, ``I wouldn't have given you a dime we could finish even 10th today.''
At Martinsville, where there were a record 18 lead changes in the 81st Winston Cup race, the idea is to keep running, and Irvan did. Perhaps most importantly, he kept running when some other drivers pitted.
On a caution during lap 441, Irvan stayed on the track when he saw Dale Earnhardt doing the same.
``When Earnhardt didn't come, we decided not to come,'' Irvan said. ``Our car really didn't want to run on brand new tires. It would take 20 laps to get going. We had 20 laps on ours.
``I don't know if it would have helped us to win the race, but it was a good call. We had a good run last week [sixth at North Wilkesboro], but we haven't been able to qualify very well.''
Irvan's comeback has been marked by comebacks. After starting second in the season-opening Daytona 500 and finishing 35th, it's mostly been a pole-day struggle for the Texaco team.
Irvan started 34th and finished 14th at Rockingham, went from 37th to fourth at Atlanta and 22nd to sixth at North Wilkesboro. His average start this season is 25th.
On Martinsville's .526-mile oval, Irvan posted 91.709 mph Friday in qualifying. That was 10 spots below the 25th-place cutoff. Saturday's run was worse - 91.593 mph. So, he started in front of only Robert Pressley and Hut Stricklin.
``If we can ever get this qualifying figured out, we'll be OK,'' McReynolds said. ``There's no other cure. We did what we did today because the car was good on long green runs.''
Irvan's best finish since his crash came on a track where his comeback was to be made this past September. Then, a SuperTruck race was rained out, so Irvan's 14th Winston Cup race at Martinsville was his first at Clay Earles' track in two years.
``We went back over the old records and figured out what we had to do,'' Irvan said of the strategy from back in the pack. ``This has worked here and it's worked every single time we were here. We had it in practice, and it didn't seem very good, but we went with it.''
Before his Winston Cup absence that ended with three races this past fall, Irvan had run well at Martinsville. He won the 1993 fall race from the pole. Seven of his past 10 races at Martinsville have produced top-10 finishes.
``I never thought we'd get back to second,'' Irvan said.
He wasn't alone.
LENGTH: Medium: 78 linesby CNB