THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, April 28, 1996 TAG: 9604280213
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C2 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY BOB ZELLER, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: TALLADEGA, ALA. LENGTH: Medium: 81 lines
Al Unser Jr. muscled past Sterling Marlin with four laps to go Saturday and then held off Robby Gordon to win the International Race of Champions at Talladega Superspeedway.
Scott Pruett was third, followed by Marlin and Terry Labonte.
A crash on the fifth lap took out half of the 12-car field running the second race of the '96 series.
``It was sad that accident at the beginning of the race took out half the field, but when there's a crash up front like that, it's tough to get through all that stuff,'' Unser said.
The accident occurred when Marlin tried to pass Dale Earnhardt going into turn three and their cars came together, sending Earnhardt spinning into the pack. Jeff Gordon, Rusty Wallace, Mark Martin, Johnny Benson and Tom Kendall also were involved. No one was hurt.
Said Earnhardt: ``I got turned around so quick, I knew it was gonna be a helluva wreck. I hit pretty hard, but not THAT hard.''
The race was stopped and a number of drivers had tires changed, including Unser.
``Dale just barely caught my left rear when he came up into the traffic, and all it did was pop my tire,'' Unser said.
After getting past Marlin on lap 35 of the 38-lap race, Unser held off Gordon by driving with his mirror.
``The second-place guy dictated where I was going,'' he said. ``Anything he did, I was going to stay in front of his car. He tried to do everything he could to get out from behind me, and I wasn't going to let him.''
STEELE WINS ARCA RACE: Although Tim Steele led 75 of the 117 laps in Saturday's ARCA race, he had to survive a wild final lap to win the race.
Andy Hillenburg muscled past Steele on the backstretch of the last lap, but Steele drafted back past Hillenburg coming into the tri-oval. And then Mark Thompson got past Hillenburg in a photo finish for second.
There were no serious accidents in the race.
ARCA PRESIDENT KILLED: Robert John Loga, 55, president of the Automobile Racing Club of America was fatally injured in an automobile accident Friday just outside the fourth turn of the speedway.
There are no designated traffic lanes on the wide expanse of asphalt and concrete outside the track and Loga's car was struck by another vehicle traveling at about 55 mph.
Two other passengers in the car were treated for minor injuries, but Loga suffered a fractured pelvis, fractured ribs and had to have his spleen removed during emergency surgery. He died early Saturday afternoon.
DYNO CHAPTER TWO: NASCAR's fiasco with the portable chassis dynamometer Friday didn't stop Ricky Rudd from taking advantage of the new machine.
Rudd, with NASCAR's permission, tested carburetors on the dynamometer Saturday morning. He wasn't intimidated by the fact that Winston Cup director Gary Nelson had damaged Ernie Irvan's pole-winning engine on the machine Friday afternoon.
But when Irvan's crew chief, Larry McReynolds, saw Rudd's car on the machine, he came over to Rudd's transporter and said, ``Ricky, are you out of your mind?''
Rudd explained the method to his madness.
``We've used it before,'' he said. ``We know what we're doing. Several teams have been using this recently.''
Rudd saw it as an opportunity to test something he otherwise would have had to test during the final practice Saturday afternoon.
And his crew chief, Richard Broome, saw it as a chance to help Nelson and help the manufacturer of the dynamometer, which he said had gotten a bad rap because of Friday's fiasco.
Irvan's car owner, Robert Yates, wasn't pleased with the episode.
``They're just trying to sell dynamometers,'' he said.
SECOND ROUND: Joe Nemechek was the fastest of several drivers who improved their speeds Saturday in a second round of time trials that saw most regulars make the race.
Nemechek reached 190.867 mph in his Chevrolet Monte Carlo, which would have given him the 12th starting spot had he made that lap Friday. He'll start 26th today.
Provisional starting spots went to Darrell Waltrip (champion's provisional), Mike Wallace, Kyle Petty, Bobby Hamilton and Brett Bodine.
Bobby Hillin, Chad Little and Phil Barkdoll failed to qualify. by CNB