Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, March 14, 1994 TAG: 9403140110
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B-5 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: BOB ZELLER STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: HAMPTON, GA. LENGTH: Medium
The Hoosier cars put up quite a fight against Ernie Irvan in Sunday's Purolator 500 at Atlanta Motor Speedway, but when the dust settled after almost 3 1/2 hours of racing, his nearly flawless Ford Thunderbird was just as dominant as it was last weekend at Richmond.
Although Irvan's margin of victory over defending champion Morgan Shepherd was only .35 seconds, he led 207 of the 328 laps, including the final 45 trips around this 1.522-mile speedway.
"If you can get two wins in a row, it really makes you feel good," Irvan said. "But the car ran good all day and we pretty much had the dominant car all day."
Irvan and Shepherd rode on Goodyear tires, but the third and fourth place cars of Darrell Waltrip and Jeff Burton - the only other cars on the lead lap - were on Hoosiers. Mark Martin finished fifth, one lap down, followed by Lake Speed and Greg Sacks.
With Waltrip, Burton and Sacks, Hoosier finally had a good race, claiming its first top 10 finishes of the 1994 season. Three Hoosier drivers led a total of 109 laps. Burton led 87 laps, Waltrip was in front for 14 laps and Geoff Bodine led eight laps before his engine broke.
Before the race was 100 laps old, it was clear that these Hoosier tires were more than one-lap qualifying wonders. The longer they went, the better they got.
Bodine was the first to demonstrate. When the green flag flew on lap 40 after a caution period, he was in fourth place. Irvan quickly shot out to a three-second lead. But Bodine gradually chased him down. He took the lead on lap 69. Four laps later, his engine blew.
Although bitterly disappointed, Bodine said, "One thing we proved here today is that the Hoosiers are here to stay. They're really good. We'd had a tough time with them up until today. But they were great today. It seemed like the longer we ran, the better we got and the slower the other guys got."
Burton, the 26-year-old rookie from South Boston, had a terrific run on the Hoosiers. Around lap 165, when Irvan had to make an extra pit stop to tighten lug nuts on one tire, Burton had a lead of about 17 seconds - about a half-lap.
"I think coming down here as a rookie and running that well pretty much shows everybody how good this team is," Burton said. "I really didn't have much confidence coming into this race. But the car worked good. And when the car works good, it makes my job a lot easier."
Waltrip came out of nowhere to finish third. He had started 40th. On lap 20, he was the last car in the pack and was fighting severe handling problems. But by lap 150, he was in the hunt. He took the lead for the first time on lap 154.
"Everybody looked at my car in practice and they said he needs to start 40th," Waltrip said. "That's right where I belonged. But we rebuilt this car this morning.
"I hope today will take a little heat off," Waltrip said. "We had a great tire today. We were behind" with the Hoosiers. "We knew that. We went to Rockingham with a tire that was basically last year's tire. We went to Richmond with an all-new design. We came here and [Hoosier president] Bob Newton told me if we were ever going to have a good weekend, this would be it."
Last week, Waltrip was on the verge of ditching the radial tire made by the Lakeview, Ind., racing tire company. But after Sunday's performance, he said, "I'm beginning to believe in [Newton]. I'm beginning to trust him. Goodyear won the race, but Hoosier had a great tire."
Newton, who saw Harry Gant win Saturday's Grand National race on his tires, seemed to be even more thrilled with Sunday's third and fourth place finishes.
"I'm tickled pink," he said. "We couldn't ask for more. You know we had 'em covered. We just needed a couple more heavy hitters, that's all."
The performance by the Hoosier cars rattled at least one Goodyear driver, who came on his radio shortly after the halfway point and said, "It's hard to believe a bunch of damn farmers from Indiana can build a better tire than these SOBs" from Goodyear.
But while Waltrip and Burton gained on Irvan during long runs under the green flag in the second half of the race, they never could catch him. Waltrip was slowed in the final laps when his power steering broke.
"The Hoosiers were tough, no doubt about that," Irvan said.
Keywords:
AUTO RACING
by CNB