Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, April 19, 1993 TAG: 9304190033
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: BOB ZELLER STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: NORTH WILKESBORO, N.C. LENGTH: Long
Instead, he finished 12th.
For the team, grieving since losing Kulwicki in an April 1 plane crash, any dream of winning Sunday ended less than a minute after the green flag flew.
In turn 4 of the first lap, Hensley was snared by a multicar accident that started when Geoff Bodine hit the wall.
"When [Bodine] came back down the track, I just barely caught him with the front end," Hensley said. "It didn't hurt the driving part of the car, but it knocked the fender down on the tire and we had to come in and get it off."
That sent him to the back of the pack and effectively ended his chances for a victory.
Later, however, Hensley showed what he could do with a fine car. He stayed in front of leader Sterling Marlin for dozens of laps, keeping Marlin from lapping him.
With 20 laps to go, Hensley was 10th when he spun in turn 4.
"We had a top-10 car, but I cut down on Dale [Earnhardt] and spun myself," he said.
Crew chief Paul Andrews wasn't complaining.
"We're real pleased with the way Jimmy ran the race for us," Andrews said. "We had a pretty good car. I don't think we had a first-place car, but it was a good car."
Kulwicki always choreographed his races and directed hiscrew from the cockpit. That now is Andrews' responsibility.
"No problem," he said. "I've always been capable of doing it."
\ BIRTHDAY BOY: Geoff Bodine turned 44 Sunday, and the birthday boy managed to steal the spotlight twice. But he could have done without either moment of glory.
The first time was in the driver's meeting, when the balding New York native showed up wearing a hairpiece.
NASCAR starter Doyle Ford, calling the roll, said, "Driver 15 car?"
Bodine raised his hand.
"No sir," Ford said. "We're looking for Geoff Bodine. You look close, but. . . ."
Everyone laughed, including Bodine, who tried to pass himself off as "Geoff's younger brother."
The second scene-stealer, of course, was his lap-1 crash.
"Who the [expletive] did that?" he shouted into his radio moments after the crash.
"That was Ernie Irvan," spotter Preston Miller replied. "You had him beat in the corner and he just ran right into you."
It was the exact opposite of last fall's race at the track, when Bodine led the entire field through 400 incident-free laps for an easy victory.
This first-lap crash involved a number of other drivers and ignited a flash fire under Mark Martin's car.
The crash started when, depending on your viewpoint, Irvan stuck the nose of his car into Bodine's left-rear quarterpanel going into turn 3 or Bodine cut down on Irvan's right-front quarterpanel.
Either way, Bodine spun and backed hard into the wall. Mark Martin then hit Bodine's rear end and tore up the side of his car. As flames erupted under Martin's car, Dick Trickle and others became involved.
"I'm a little embarrassed we can't start a race and not have a wreck," Martin said. "About all we can do for the rest of the day is get this fixed and get back in the race for points."
It took 19 laps to clean up the mess, and all of the drivers eventually got back into the race.
Bodine finished 28th, Martin was 31st and Trickle was 33rd.
\ EARLY PROBLEMS: All of the big problems happened at the beginning of this largely incident-free race.
Only 11 of the first 40 laps were run under the green flag.
Six green-flag laps after the Bodine melee, Jeff Gordon slammed into the second-turn wall and another fire erupted.
This blaze looked more dangerous, enveloping Gordon's car, but after a few moments, he scrambled out.
Even before the fire crews were finished extinguishing the blaze, crew chief Ray Evernham was barking orders to his mechanics in hope of repairing Gordon's battered car.
"We're going to fix it come hell or high water," Evernham said.
It was a lost cause. After working for almost an hour, the crew gave up. The Chevy was too badly damaged to continue. Gordon was the first driver in the 34-car field to drop out.
"I came into the first turn and went to hit the brakes and the pedal just went to the floor," Gordon said. "I just drove into turn 1 with no brakes. I finally got the pedal pumped up enough to get it sideways, but it tore it up pretty bad."
\ MAST CAN'T GET GOING: After finishing 19th, Rick Mast said his team has been stymied this year by the short tracks.
"You know when I said that the worst-handling car I've ever had was at Bristol?" Mast said. "Well, we topped it today. It just didn't handle all weekend. It wouldn't turn good in the corners and it never hooked up good."
\ RUDD LOOKING AHEAD: Ricky Rudd stayed on the lead lap all afternoon and finished seventh for his second top-10 finish of the year.
"We were a lot better than we were at the last Wilkesboro race," he said. "We just got out of sync on our pit stops.
"Our biggest problem has been our short-track record, but the car was better here than we've been in some time. Ken Schrader [who finished third] used a slightly different setup then we did, so between the two of us, I think we can come back to Martinsville next weekend in good shape."
Keywords:
AUTO RACING
by CNB