Longtime owner seems to have secret to success at Las Vegas Motor Speedway

Friday, March 2, 2001 | 10:43 a.m.

When asked to explain his success at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, team owner Jack Roush admitted to having a secret advantage.

It's his drivers, Roush said.

Mark Martin won the inaugural NASCAR Winston Cup race at LVMS in 1998 and Jeff Burton has won the past two races. In all, Roush Racing has won the past five Winston Cup and Busch Series races at the 1.5-mile superspeedway; Martin won the Busch event in 1999 and Burton won it last year.

"I used to think that Mark and Jeff were drivers who just adapted really quickly to new tracks," Roush said. "As the string continues, I guess I have just underestimated the guys."

Martin agreed with his boss.

"Basically, it all comes down to drivers and teams that excel here," Martin said. "(My car) has, (Burton's) car has excelled here -- by the way, they have everywhere else, too.

"It's just a matter of drivers and crews getting it done, that's all."

Roush Racing, with a stable of four drivers that includes Martin, Burton, Matt Kenseth and Las Vegas native Kurt Busch, will try to extend its streak this weekend as LVMS plays host to Saturday's Sam's Town 300 Busch Series race and Sunday's UAW-DaimlerChrysler 400 Winston Cup race.

Burton, like Roush, is eager to see Las Vegas come up on the Winston Cup schedule.

"I'm excited about heading to Vegas again," Burton said. "Last year was pretty big for us, winning the Busch and Cup races, but that doesn't mean anything as far as an advantage heading there this year.

"I've had great success at the Las Vegas Speedway. Of course, we like running at tracks that we've done well at, so we're looking forward to this weekend. We also won the Busch race last year, so you can imagine how happy we were after that weekend. I'm running the Busch race again this weekend, so it would be pretty cool if we could do it all over again a year later."

Roush, however, isn't so certain his stable of Fords will be competing on an even playing field this weekend. Roush was among the handful of Ford team owners who complained at the season-opening Daytona 500 that the Fords were at an aerodynamic disadvantage to the Chevy, Pontiac and Dodge entries.

"If we are at a disadvantage at Las Vegas, it will be for other reasons," Roush said. "Chevrolet got a two-inch consideration on their nose -- which helps them with front downforce -- after the cars were approved last year and we haven't got a consideration back to balance that.

"They have an advantage in front downforce, I think. As for what Dodge has, we'll have to see a race before we know. In testing, the Chevrolets were faster on the new tire when we tested here."

Actually, it was Johnny Benson in a Pontiac who posted the fastest time during a week-long open test at LVMS in late January. Benson's top speed of 173.376 mph established an unofficial track record, bettering Ricky Rudd's qualifying mark of 172.563 mph set last year.

The next three fastest cars, however, were the Fords of Todd Bodine, Rusty Wallace and Elliott Sadler, followed by Michael Waltrip (Chevy), Andy Houston (Ford), Jerry Nadeau (Chevy) and Joe Nemechek (Chevy). The Fords of Martin and Robert Pressley rounded out the top-10 speeds during that test.

Led by a pair of Dale Earnhardt Inc., drivers, Chevrolet has won the first two races of the season. Waltrip captured the season-opening Daytona 500 to break a personal 462-race winless streak and Steve Park won his second career Winston Cup race Monday at Rockingham.

Racing politics aside, virtually every driver in the garage area agrees on one point: Las Vegas Motor Speedway is one of their favorite stops on the Winston Cup circuit -- largely because of the wide, smooth racing surface.

"I swear when they built (this track), somebody just kept going out there and saying, 'Make it a little wider, a little wider, a little wider. Now make it perfectly smooth,' " Burton said.

"So you've got a perfectly smooth, really wide race track. That should give you all the space and lanes that you need."

Besides paying more than $350,000 for first place, Sunday's UAW-DaimlerChrysler 400 also is a Winston "No Bull 5" event. If Kenny Wallace, Joe Nemechek, Jeff Gordon, Terry Labonte or Mike Skinner wins the race, they also will claim a $1 million bonus from series sponsor Winston.

The biggest change during this year's race weekend is that NASCAR has instituted a new qualifying procedure that eliminates second-round qualifying. There will be only one round of qualifying today, with each car taking two qualifying laps to determine the top 36 starting positions.