THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, March 12, 1995 TAG: 9503120460
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C10 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY BOB ZELLER, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: HAMPTON, GA. LENGTH: Medium: 90 lines
The pole position is the least significant big deal in Winston Cup stock-car racing.
Every race weekend, teams devote a whole day to trying to win it.
Every pole day, at least one member of every team carefully charts the lap times of every driver who competes in pole qualifying.
And at The Virginian-Pilot and The Ledger-Star, the most common telephone inquiry regarding NASCAR racing is, ``Who won the pole?''
But once the green flag falls on Sunday, the pole doesn't mean a thing. Last year, in fact, there were four races in which the pole winner failed to lead a single lap.
``It's a big deal, and it's nothing,'' said Rick Mast, who won the pole for last year's inaugural Brickyard 400 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. ``It's all it's cracked up to be, and it's not.''
The fact that Dale Earnhardt is on the pole for today's Purolator 500 at Atlanta Motor Speedway is significant because Earnhardt is a much better driver than he is a qualifier. Earnhardt has won 63 races but only 18 poles. His average finish last year was a series-leading 8.03, but his average starting position was a mediocre 15.25.
So, as Geoff Bodine put it, ``When that driver, that team and that car qualifies well, you've got your hands full in the race.''
But generally, the pole position is more significant off the track.
``Public relations-wise, you win money when you sit on the pole,'' said Michael Waltrip, who has won two. ``You get in the Busch Clash when you sit on the pole. If you win the most poles, you get a lot of money.''
``Your sponsor gets a lot of exposure,'' said Bodine, who won more poles last year - five - than anyone else. ``And some sponsors pay bonuses for winning the pole position. Plus, on the psychological side, it's good for the team and driver. It keeps everybody pumped up.''
``I truly believe that sometimes winning poles gets you more press than winning races,'' said Ricky Rudd, who has won 21 poles. ``In the papers on Monday morning, it's strictly who won the race. But most of the time you've got Saturday and Sunday stories that mention the pole winner.''
But the most frequent race winners tend to have less respect for the top starting spot.
``It's just a pimple'' on the Winston Cup landscape, said Mark Martin. ``You gotta be able to drive to the lead. Starting there doesn't mean anything. It's great to get poles. You need a pole once in a while for a lot of different reasons, but it doesn't have much of an impact on the race.''
``It's nothing,'' said Rusty Wallace. ``Qualifying don't mean squat. It just costs us a lot of money and tires, that's about it. I've won more races from 20th spot than anything.''
To a fellow like Loy Allen Jr., however, winning three poles last year was the difference between success and failure in his rookie season, especially considering that he failed to qualify for 12 of 31 races. ``That helped us out a ton,'' Allen said. ``It gave the team a lot of morale.''
For the record, seven out of 31 pole winners last year went on to win the race. In 15 races, the pole winner finished in the top five. But in four races, the pole winner failed to lead a lap.
``I think a lot of the significance had to do with where you get the pole,'' Mast said. ``If you get the pole for the Daytona 500 (as Allen did last year), you've got a week to live it up. If you get the pole at Indy, that's an accomplishment because you get a lot of mileage on that one.
``We probably got more out of that on the short term than if we'd won the Daytona 500. Our T-shirt sales went through the roof. We sold more at Indy than probably four or five other races combined. I took two souvenir trailers up there and pretty much unloaded them babies.
``But as far as the actual race, it doesn't make one bit of difference to me because the races are so long.''
Mast said most drivers will try hard for the pole only if they have one of the fastest cars in practice.
``If you're out there practicing within a half of a tenth of a second of the fastest car, you'll do a little more'' to try to win the pole, he said.
But a driver can easily try too hard.
``Our situation this weekend is a great example,'' said Michael Waltrip. ``We had a shot at the pole. We had a good car all through practice. I went out in qualifications and attempted to get the pole and coming off turn four I lost it. I was just lucky I didn't wreck.
``So here I am in the second round, and now our focus went from getting the pole to running the second round just to get in the race.''
Waltrip failed to qualify and needed a provisional starting spot to make today's race.
``There's been worse situations,'' Waltrip said. ``That's to qualify 30th or 35th in the first round without having any problems and simply not being fast enough.''
As Brett Bodine put it: ``The race is the big picture. Qualifying is just the small picture.'' by CNB