Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, March 23, 1992 TAG: 9203230109
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: RANDY KING SPORTSWRITER
DATELINE: MARTINSVILLE LENGTH: Medium
"We didn't have nothing," Wallace said. "No team, no car, no nothing.
"I was beginning to wonder just what was going to happen to me."
What's happened is Wallace has gone from the outhouse to the penthouse. In a hurry.
Wallace, who six weeks ago had no idea where or for whom he was going to drive in 1992, continued his racing resurrection Sunday at Martinsville Speedway, winning the 200-lap Busch Grand National feature of the Miller 500 tripleheader.
"This is the best one of them all," Wallace said after his third career Busch Grand National victory. "This is a emotional deal for me.
"I can't believe with all that's happened that we have three top-five finishes and have won a race. I'm not a real religious person, but somebody is looking over us."
Wallace steered his Pontiac to the front at the race's midway point and built a sizeable lead, only to watch his cushion erased by a couple of late caution flags.
But Wallace fought off his suddenly ill-handling car, not to mention a stout late-race challenge from Joe Nemechek and Chuck Bown, to win by three car lengths.
Nemechek, racing door-to-door with Bown coming out of the fourth turn, won the wild scramble for second place when his spinning car caromed off Bown's spinning car and bounced across the finish line first.
Robert Pressley, Tracy Leslie, Jeff Gordon, Butch Miller and local favorite Jimmy Hensley rounded out the top eight, all finishing on the lead lap.
Wallace, the 28-year-old younger brother of Winston Cup star Rusty Wallace, padded his lead in the Grand National standings by 30 points.
"I can thank Felix Sabates for all this. He saved us," Wallace said.
Sabates, owner of Kyle Petty's Winston Cup team, rescued Wallace's career in early February. Sabates bought a couple of Busch Grand National cars and threw a life-preserver to Wallace, whose status was tied up by litigation involving the financially troubled Team III operation. Originally, Wallace was to drive Winston Cup cars for Team III.
Wallace started 15th in the 29-car field and had the lead by lap 100. He was coasting with a 3.5-second lead on Nemechek when Leslie spun, bringing out the yellow flag.
"I didn't want to see any yellows," Wallace said. "On restarts when the tires were cold, my car was horrendous, totally out of control."
Despite three more yellow-flag periods, Wallace owned the lead when the race went back to green for the final time with seven laps to go.
Nemechek and Bown applied a lot of heat to Wallace's back bumper in the final laps but didn't find enough horsepower or room to muster a pass.
"I was just hanging the car out," Wallace said. "I knew I had it won when I got into turn three on the final lap. I knew I had it if nobody hit me from behind."
Nemechek and Bown were too busy slugging it out to apply a hit to Wallace.
"If I'd had two, three more laps, I may could have done something with [Wallace]," Bown said. "I thought I had Nemechek cleared on the last lap, but I guess Joe got a little frustrated and didn't want to give up second.
"He clipped me in the left quarterpanel. I got sideways, then he really hit me. Guess he spun across before I did to get second.
"At least we finished. With the year we've had so far, we'll take it."
Wallace, who averaged a race record 72.225 mph and earned $19,150, was one of four drivers to lead.
Pole-sitter Ricky Craven, whose victory chances were eliminated when his car got tangled up with Bown's on lap 84 and lost a lap, led the first 30 laps. Leslie led the next 11 laps before Nemechek took the point for the next 58.
Then Wallace took over.
"This place owed us one," Wallace said. "We've ran out of gas here twice on the last lap. Today, we knew we could go the distance [105.2 miles] without a fuel stop.
"Man, I'm happy. Talk about going from nowhere to somewhere fast."
Keywords:
AUTO RACING
by CNB