Todd Bodine wins Sam’s Town 300

Saturday, March 3, 2001 | 4:57 a.m.

Todd Bodine tuned up for Sunday's UAW-DaimlerChrysler 400 by dominating Saturday's Sam's Town 300 NASCAR Busch Series race at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.

Bodine, who qualified sixth for Sunday's Winston Cup race, overcame two bad pit stops to win his second Busch Series race in three starts this season.

Bodine led 103 of the 200 laps and had built a commanding 10-second lead over Greg Biffle when Bodine pitted with 58 laps remaining. Bodine's pit crew had trouble getting a lug nut on and by the time he finally got back out on the track, he was running in 10th place.

Earlier in the race, a jack failed during one of Bodine's pit stops.

"We had a lot of problems that we overcame and that's the sign of a good race team and a good car," Bodine said. "I just knew that we had to be patient."

Bodine's patience paid off in the closing laps. Bodine passed Biffle on lap 187 and again started to pull away when Larry Foyt blew an engine and spun down the frontstretch.

NASCAR threw the red flag while track workers cleaned up the spilled oil and restarted the race on lap 197. Bodine and Biffle battled side-by-side through the first three turns before Bodine pulled away and held on for a 1.085-second victory over Biffle.

Jason Keller finished third, Tony Raines was fourth and Jeff Green rounded out the top five.

Bodine said he never feared that he and Biffle would take each other out in the closing laps.

"I never thought that once," said Bodine, who won last weekend's Busch race in Rockingham. "I trust Greg. I've seen him race trucks and he's an awesome racer."

Biffle said he believed Bodine had the fastest car on the track Saturday.

"We knew we couldn't beat him today," Biffle said. "We just had to beat him with pit strategy or out-race him on the racetrack by being smarter than him because he had the fastest car; it's that simple.

"He would drive away from me on the straightaway, he was a lot better than me down in (turns) three and four and I was about as good or maybe a little better in one and two but that's all we could do today."

Jeff Burton, who has won the past two Winston Cup races at LVMS and won the Sam's Town 300 last year, finished sixth and was followed in the top 10 by Joe Nemechek, Elton Sawyer, Mike McLaughlin and Jay Sauter.

Pole-sitter Matt Kenseth made contact with Biffle, spun and hit the wall on the backstretch on lap 78. Kenseth's car suffered heavy damage and he finished in 34th place, 18 laps off the pace.

Seven caution periods (for 27 laps) slowed the average speed of the race to 125.625 mph. There were 16 lead changes among seven drivers.