Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, February 12, 1991 TAG: 9102120069
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: BOB ZELLER SPORTSWRITER
DATELINE: DAYTONA BEACH, FLA. LENGTH: Long
"I'm not sure that he's in a position to run off and leave everybody," Kyle Petty said Monday. "Yesterday, in the [second half of the] Busch race, we were all bottled up. Everybody got trapped behind the 11 [Geoff Bodine] and 18 [Greg Sacks] cars and we really didn't have any place to go. So it played right into Earnhardt's hands.
"I think he's strong, I think Mark Martin is strong. I think Bill Elliott is strong and I think Davey [Allison] is going to be strong," Petty added. "There's four cars right now that are really strong cars; they are stronger than everybody else.
"Still, even at that, I don't think they're going to get out and hook up and run away from everybody. The other cars are strong enough to run with them. They're just not strong enough to lead them."
In Sunday's two-part Busch Clash, Earnhardt started sixth in the first 10-lap race, took the lead on the second lap and won, although not going away.
Under the Clash's new rules, the field was inverted and Earnhardt started the second race at the back of the pack in 14th. He passed four cars on the first lap and polished off the rest of the field on the second lap, taking the lead for good going into the third turn.
"It was quite a move," Alan Kulwicki said.
"I didn't believe we could do it," Earnhardt said Sunday.
"I made a pass just like that in the IROC race here three years ago," Rusty Wallace said. "I started 12th - dead last - and I came off turn 2 and the whole field started spreading all over the place and they started slowing each other down and I got a good run off all that messed-up air. I went right to the apron and pulled into third place in the third turn. I come back around and made one more lap and I was leading the race. And I won the race."
Wallace said he doesn't believe Earnhardt is unbeatable. "He's obviously got this restrictor-plate thing figured out, but . . . there's too many cars that were sitting right up there on his bumper, and if they could have ever got around him, I don't know if he could have gotten back around them.
"He's strong, but if I could have got past [Sacks], I think I could have won the race. But [Earnhardt is] one of the favorites. If a guy starts 14th and wins the race, I'd say he's pretty strong."
Mark Martin said the Clash demonstrated "that Dale Earnhardt's car takes off faster than everybody else's, just like it did last year, and you don't have a prayer in staying up with him that first 200 yards when they restart these races.
"Other than that, I don't think he's tougher than a half-dozen other cars."
Daytona 500 pole sitter Davey Allison, who watched the Clash from the sideline this year, said Earnhardt impressed him. "I figure he's the guy to beat this week, and I said that before the Clash. His engine really runs good right where it needs to on the race track - right in the middle of the corner."
Some thought Earnhardt's car was not that much stronger than others because he did not pull away from the field after taking the lead in either Clash segment.
"I don't think he really tried to," Allison said. "If I was Dale - in his shoes - and it being the Busch Clash and not the Daytona 500, I don't think I would have wanted to run away from everybody else. It would have made it awful tough for him the rest of this week. Too many eyes would have been on him."
Brett Bodine, for one, believes Earnhardt clobbered the Clash field by virtue of pure power.
"He has a big advantage and the Clash showed it," Bodine said. "When you make a move to the bottom of the race track and pass 10 cars, that's horsepower."
Still, Allison said, Earnhardt is hardly invincible. "He's tough, but eventually somebody's going to get tougher, and we want it to be us and we want it to be this week. That's our goal this week - to beat Dale Earnhardt and everybody else who is here."
\ PIT STOPS: Dick Moroso, still struggling daily with the loss of son Rob in a traffic accident last fall, will try to get two cars into this year's 500. One car, sponsored by Glad for this race only, will be driven by sprint car ace Sammy Swindell. The other car is unsponsored. It is being driven by Bobby Hillin, Moroso said, and will be named the "Rob Moroso Memorial Car" if it makes the field.
Moroso said recently that he threw out all the sleeping pills and antidepressants he had been taking to help him cope with the tragedy.
"You've got to have a clear mind out here," he said. "But I get more emotional. I break down a couple of times a day. It's a tough row to hoe."
Ricky Rudd's crew, helped by members of other teams, spent much of the day repairing the body damage on his car from Sunday's Clash crash. The team also decided to replace the steering box after he practiced with the car Monday morning, but Rudd said the car should be fine for the 500.
Ken Schrader, who also was involved in the crash, switched to his backup car and requalified Monday. His speed, 192.852 mph, was considerably slower than the 194.045 mph he posted Saturday (eighth-fastest) and will force him to start further back in the field in his Twin 125 qualifying race Thursday.
Dick Beaty, Winston Cup competition director, said NASCAR made one modification in the new pit rules after Sunday's ARCA race: If a car is involved in a collision, pit-crew members will be allowed to go out to the right side of the car on yellow-flag stops to pull sheet metal away from tires. However, they must go around the front of the car, so they can see up the track, and they cannot change tires without penalty.
Keywords:
AUTO RACING
by CNB