ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, May 5, 1996 TAG: 9605070012
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C-7 EDITION: METRO
COLUMN: AUTO RACING NOTES
DATELINE: SONOMA, CALIF.
SOURCE: BOB ZELLER STAFF WRITER
For only the second time this season, all of the regulars in the NASCAR Winston Cup series have made a race.
The 44-car field in today's Save Mart 300 at Sears Point International Raceway includes every full-season campaigner except Elton Sawyer, whose unsponsored team chose not to make the trip to the West Coast.
Second-round qualifying Saturday was busy but uneventful.
Nineteen cars ran in the session. Jeff Burton was slow again.
He was 45th fastest - slowest of the regulars.
But Burton earned one of the provisional starting spots along with Steve Grissom, Mike Wallace and Dave Marcis.
Two other provisional spots went to NASCAR Southwest Tour regulars Larry Gunselman and Rich Woodland Jr.
The only other race this year in which all of the regulars made the field was the TranSouth 400 at Darlington Raceway in Darlington, S.C., in March.
WINSTON WEST RACE: You probably haven't heard of these guys, but Doug McCoun of Prunedale, Calif., managed to keep his slightly smoking Pontiac Grand Prix ahead of Craig Raudman's Chevy in a wild final lap of the Pennzoil 200 for NASCAR Southwest tour cars.
Raudman pulled even with McCoun in the final turn, but McCoun said, ``I knew if the motor kept running, I was going to win the drag race to the finish line. At that point, I was either going to crash and burn or go for it.''
TRACK RECORD OVERSIGHT: Terry Labonte's pole-winning speed Friday of 92.524 mph was a track record around this 12-turn, 2.52-mile road course.
The next three qualifiers, Ricky Rudd, Ron Hornaday Jr. and Mark Martin, also beat the record, which was 92.132 mph set by Rudd here last year.
CHANGING TIMES: A few years ago, you could count on either Rusty Wallace or Rudd winning the NASCAR road races.
But Dale Earnhardt's first road course victory here last year and Labonte's first pole here Friday demonstrate how that's changed.
``There's a bunch of guys you've got to factor in now,'' Rudd said. ``It seems like we've been chasing Mark [Martin] and Jack Roush on these road courses ever since they paired up.
``And Labonte, he was a good road racer, but he wasn't in good equipment for a lot of years. But now he's in good equipment. So that's two more you've got to race.
``And all of a sudden Earnhardt knows how to get around this place pretty good. You can go down the list, but it used to [be] simple when you came here.''
KENDALL'S HOPES: Trans-Am road racing starter Tommy Kendall doesn't mind getting the calls to substitute for injured drivers in road races, but he hopes it will turn into something more in NASCAR racing.
``It would be nice if it could springboard me into more opportunities,'' he said. ``Schedule permitting, I'd like to do some more this year. I've tried to put some deals together to run some Busch races and some truck stuff, but the fact of the matter is the Trans-Am work is full-time as it is. Doing as well as we do there in a way hampers my ability to pursue this.''
LENGTH: Medium: 61 linesby CNB