Marlin breaks long winning drought at Cheez-It 250

Pete Iacobelli

Saturday, March 25, 2000 | 3:25 a.m.

BRISTOL, Tenn. - Sterling Marlin, winless in Busch Grand National competition for 10 years, avoided a rash of crashes Saturday and won the Cheez-It 250.

Marlin, starting 16th, pushed his way to the front and pretty much stayed there, leading 98 of the last 116 laps. It was his second career Busch victory. The other came at Lowe's Motor Speedway in October of 1990.

The hardest thing for Marlin, a Winston Cup regular who hasn't won on the big circuit in nearly four years was to stay free of the wreckage that always seems to pile up at Bristol Motor Speedway.

Marlin's Chevrolet was almost taken out when Michael Waltrip tried to return to the track after spinning out on the backstretch on lap 207.

"You couldn't stick a piece of paper between those two," said Jeff Green, the polesitter who finished second.

Then, 21 laps later, Marlin slipped by an accident between Busch points leader Matt Kenseth and defending champion Jason Keller.

But on restart after restart, Marlin calmly surged to the front. He held on to beat Green by .736 seconds.

"I always wanted to win here," said Marlin, born in Franklin, Tenn. "I love this race track, and wanted to win in Tennessee. If we win tomorrow, it'll be great. This is a start."

Marlin will start 28th in Sunday's Food City 500.

Todd Bodine was third, followed by Kenny Wallace, Randy LaJoie, David Green and Ricky Craven. Hank Parker Jr., Keller and Dick Trickle finished the top 10.

Marlin's victory kept alive a season's streak of Winston Cup regulars dominating the Saturday series. Mark Martin has won three of the six Busch events this year, Jeff Burton and Kenseth - Martin's Roush Racing teammates - have won the others.

"Those Cup guys keep winning and ruining our party," Green said. "But we're going to get our share."

Marlin says he always feels at home at Bristol - he even drove a Busch car sponsored by the University of Tennessee Volunteers - even though he'd never won here in Busch or Winston Cup cars.

"Glad to finally get something here," said Marlin, who earned $28,260. "We had to dodge a lot of traffic to do it."

Marlin's winning average speed of 74.813 mph was slowed by 10 caution periods for 68 laps.

The largest accident occurred on lap 214 when 14 cars, including Waltrip for the second time, tangled coming off the 36-degree banking in turns three and four.

Keller, who qualified second but was sent to the back of the field for jumping the starter's flag, was part of three accidents as he tried to push his car back toward the lead.

"It looked like 'Days of Thunder' with all those cars lying there everywhere and all that trash on the race track," Green said.

"Patience was about all you could have out there," Bodine said.

The oddest moment was the wreck that didn't happen. Blaise Alexander left pit road after repairs during one caution and nearly ran into the race track's blow-dry truck cleaning up against the wall in turn four.