Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, October 23, 1995 TAG: 9510230157
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B-3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: BOB ZELLER STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: ROCKINGHAM, N.C. LENGTH: Long
It's one thing when your car breaks down early while you're running in the bottom 20. Mast has seen that happen often enough this year.
But it's quite another when you're all but running away with a race, as Mast was doing in the AC-Delco 400 on Sunday at North Carolina Motor Speedway.
But instead of going to Victory Lane, Mast went home early. And the victory went instead to a fellow Virginian - Ward Burton - who also had not won a Winston Cup race.
Mast had led the most laps - 139 - when trouble struck just before a yellow flag on lap 257 for Gary Bradberry's crash.
To the spectators, what happened next was something of a shock. Mast rolled into the pits as the leader for what appeared to be a routine pit stop.
But he never came out.
The driver from Rockbridge Baths already knew he was in trouble.
``It dropped a cylinder one lap before that caution came out,'' he said. ``What can I say? Story of our year. We were able to show all day what we had.
``We were just trying to hang on to the end and stay out of trouble, be cool and calm. Boom! It's gone.''
And so one more shot was fired by a game underdog, and once more, that shot came up short. Mast's ability did not desert him, nor did his heart. It was the engine that did again.
NASCAR REPORT CARD: The controversy that erupted after NASCAR officials unfairly penalized Dale Earnhardt late in the race, then threw a yellow flag to try to correct it prompted a slew of interesting assessments:
Driver Rusty Wallace: ``NASCAR is going to have to sort this one out. I'm just as confused as they are.''
Points leader Jeff Gordon: ``I've never seen anything like what happened there at the end.''
Crew chief Ray Evernham: ``It was really a crazy day ... but I don't understand everything that's going on there.''
Driver Mark Martin: ``I'm glad to run third and I'm not going to worry about the rest of it. But it is all messed up.''
Car owner Jack Roush: ``There should be a pretty severe penalty on the NASCAR inspector... I don't think anybody wants to see him around again.''
Bill Davis: ``It was really a bizarre ending.''
Driver Ricky Rudd: ``It's pretty hard to believe they would turn the whole race upside down for one guy.''
Car owner Richard Petty: ``I'm just glad my car wasn't involved in all that.''
NASCAR RESPONSE: Bill France, NASCAR's president, said the final yellow flag was thrown to rectify a mistaken penalty given to Earnhardt because ``we didn't want to influence the championship. We wanted it decided on the race track.''
``When you've got a championship riding, we didn't want it to be decided on our mistake.''
Kevin Triplett, a NASCAR spokesman, said the inspector who made the incorrect call in the pits would not be disciplined. ``He's a good man - one of our best officials,'' Triplett said. ``He made a mistake. The matter is closed.''
POINTS RACE: Gordon lost 43 points of his lead in the Winston Cup championship to Earnhardt, but he still has a 162-point advantage with two races left.
All Gordon needs to do is finish 20th in the final events and the title is his, no matter what Earnhardt does. And Gordon could lose another 10 points to Earnhardt at Phoenix and still clinch the title there.
The maximum points a driver can get in a race is 185 points. The fewest any starter can get is 34 points for 43rd place.
``We're having a little bit of bad luck right now, but I don't think it's going to stay that way for the next two races,'' said Gordon, who finished 20th, two laps down, after a spin and bad timing on pit stops. ``Crazy things happened all day. I think it's been nail-biting time for a long time.''
WALTRIP'S ADVENTURES: If you saw Michael Waltrip's first crash on television, you'd have to say it was pretty amazing he even had the opportunity to get into another one.
But there he was, running round and round in an already wrecked car when rookie Shane Hall crashed in turn 4 on lap 212 and sent Waltrip's car into the water barrels at the end of the pit wall.
The resulting explosion of water virtually guaranteed Waltrip air time on the Sunday night sports highlight shows. The speedway had to bring out its brush-equipped tractors to mop up after the crash.
``I think Sterling [Marlin] holds the record,'' Waltrip said after his second crash. ``I've seen him wreck four times in one night at Bristol. Even if they get it fixed, I don't think I'll wreck again.''
The team didn't get the car fixed, and Waltrip finished 38th.
Waltrip's first wreck was the big one of the day's six mishaps. Bobby Hamilton spun in turn 4, and Waltrip plowed into Mike Wallace as the track was obscured with smoke. Ken Schrader then hit Waltrip. Dale Jarrett also was involved.
``Bobby spun out and boiled his tires and smoked up the joint,'' Waltrip said. ``I didn't see [Wallace] and whoever was behind me didn't see me.''
Said Schrader: ``I just ran into Michael as hard as I could.''
``It just created a big, old smoke screen,'' Wallace said. ``I just slowed up so much I got run in the back of. We thought we were slowing down to miss a wreck and got involved in a big one.''
by CNB