Martinsville produces lots of different winners

Thursday, Sept. 30, 1999 | 4:06 a.m.

MARTINSVILLE, Va. - Based on recent history, the winner of the NAPA AutoCare 500 at Martinsville Speedway is likely to be a surprise.

Sunday's race over the .533-mile, paperclip-shaped oval is the last of eight short track races this season. It is likely to be unpredictable considering that the last 11 Winston Cup races on tracks shorter than one mile have produced 11 different winners.

That list includes Ricky Rudd, the defending champion in the fall race at Martinsville, as well as Jeff Gordon, Bobby Hamilton, Terry Labonte, Mark Martin, Jeff Burton, Rusty Wallace, John Andretti, Dale Jarrett, Dale Earnhardt and rookie Tony Stewart.

"It's just that the competition is that good now," said Jarrett, who enters the opening of practice and qualifying Friday with a 257-point lead over Martin in the season standings.

The second-generation NASCAR star says there are so many drivers so close in competition these days that when "somebody hits on something for a particular race and gets good track position at the end of the race" he can get an advantage.

"Maybe they weren't the best all day, but I think there are just so many people who can get the job done on a given day," Jarrett added.

Jarrett says that isn't true just on the short tracks, either. He notes there have been 11 different winners in the first 27 races this season.

"You talk about parity in other sports," he said. "I think we have that much here that when you get on short tracks where handling is the total key, that you don't have too many other things. (Aerodynamics) don't matter that much. The engine combination or having a lot of horsepower doesn't come into play that much, so you bring more people into the mix."

Rudd, winless since last year at Martinsville, needs a victory in the final seven events of this season to extend his string of 16 straight years with at least one triumph.

The three-time Martinsville winner, who runs his own team, says that having a one-car operation is a handicap at most tracks in this day of rich, multicar teams. But not at the short ovals.

"Some of these teams are putting millions of dollars a year in an aerodynamic program, and those millions spent make a big difference at tracks like Dover or Charlotte or Atlanta or Michigan," Rudd said. "But that does absolutely no good for Martinsville or Bristol. At those type of tracks, that money is not money wisely spent because you can just about rule out aerodynamics."

Martin has a simple explanation for the procession of winners here.

"Martinsville is really tough," he said. "When you put 43 cars on that track, that's about 10 cars more than what you'd like to see out there."

Each of the four short tracks remaining on the NASCAR schedule is unique. Martinsville has been described as two drag strips connected at each end by two narrow turns.

Earnhardt, a five-time winner at Martinsville, said, "This is a finesse track. You have to calculate your moves. You can't go into the turns and expect to make time by scrubbing your tires. You have to accelerate, brake, turn and be smooth on the steering wheel for 500 laps, and at the same time avoid trouble while running in traffic all day. That isn't easy."