DATE: Friday, November 14, 1997             TAG: 9711140911

SECTION: SPORTS                  PAGE: C3   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY LON WAGNER, STAFF WRITER  

                                            LENGTH:   53 lines

FALK HOPES TO END ROOKIE SEASON WITH A ROAR A GOOD FINISH SUNDAY AT ATLANTA COULD HELP REEL IN A SPONSOR FOR '98.

Joe Falk will spend the final weekend of this year's Winston Cup season like he spent the rest of his rookie year as a team owner:

Trying to qualify, juicing the No. 91 Chevy Monte Carlo for - he hopes - a top 20 finish, then working the corporate network to try to pull down a sponsor.

Falk, who owns Little Joe's Autos in Chesapeake, has learned many lessons during his first year on NASCAR's top circuit. Foremost among them: You need to run well to keep a sponsor happy, and you need a sponsor to pay the bills.

``I don't think you can sell enough cars in Tidewater to be able to do this yourself,'' Falk said this week before heading to Atlanta for the NAPA 500. ``It's a pretty expensive sport.''

Falk found out just how expensive in midseason when Hormel Foods backed out on its deal to pay $2.6 million to make Spam his car's primary sponsor. He kept the team going by funding several races out of his own pocket.

When racing at Indianapolis could make or break Falk's season, Winston Cup veteran Greg Sacks put Falk's Chevy in the field. The team's 31st-place finish in the Brickyard 400 was a disappointment, but it helped Falk land a three-race deal with Maine-based Pioneer Plastics.

Falk then signed Busch Grand National driver Kevin Lepage, but the team did not qualify to race at the New Hampshire 300.

At the UAW-GM Quality 500 early last month in Charlotte, Lepage qualified for the 12th position, the best start the team had all year. But during the race, Lepage ``was running well, then got caught up in a wreck,'' Falk said.

The following week in Talladega, Lepage qualified at the end of the field, 38th, for the Sears Diehard 500. Lepage finished 17th and on the lead lap.

Falk served as crew chief during those two races, after Todd Myers left the team to work on the NASCAR truck circuit.

``I jumped in and took on that added responsibility of trying to get things focused,'' Falk said. ``It worked out better for us, but it's been so hard for us, it's unbelieveable.''

Lepage and the car performed well last week during testing in Atlanta; they recorded the fifth-fastest time of 25 teams that practiced.

Once again, though, a lot will ride on whether Falk's team qualifies for the race and then runs well. With only two months between seasons, it's already time to hire a crew chief, sign a deal with a driver and arrange for an engine supplier for the 1998 Winston Cup season.

``We're just about at the point where we have to nail down a sponsorship,'' Falk says, ``or say we can't run the series.'' ILLUSTRATION: File photo

NASCAR car owner Joe Falk, left, is keeping an eye out for

sponsorship for his No. 91 Chevy for 1998. ``It's a pretty expensive

sport,'' he says.

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