Burton snags win

Monday, Feb. 18, 2002 | 9:47 a.m.

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- The 44th running of the Daytona 500 long will be remembered more for who lost the race -- and how -- as opposed to who won.

Sterling Marlin spun out Jeff Gordon to take the lead with six laps remaining and then beat Ward Burton back to the yellow flag by a few feet. But NASCAR officials threw the red flag -- stopping all the cars on the backstretch -- to give the drivers a chance to race to the finish after the track was cleared of debris.

Marlin, who sustained a bent right-front fender after colliding with Gordon, got out of his car and attempted to pull the sheet metal, which was rubbing the right-front tire, away from the tire.

That's a big no-no.

NASCAR officials, who caught Marlin in the act, sent him back to his car and then to the back of the lead pack as a penalty, effectively ending his hopes of a third Daytona 500 victory. When the race restarted, Burton held onto the lead for the final three laps to win his first Daytona 500.

But the postrace focus was not on Burton or the fact that Dodge had won a Daytona 500 for the first time since 1974, but on the 44-year-old Marlin -- who pleaded ignorance of the rules.

"Never read the rulebook ... maybe I should," Marlin said sheepishly.

"This is the Daytona 500 and you're going to try to win the thing," Marlin said of his run-in with Gordon. "I tried to get a run on Jeff, and as soon as I got across the line I hooked left and got up in his quarterpanel. I got my fender on the tire. We tried to get it pulled off, but NASCAR didn't like it.

"I saw (Dale) Earnhardt do it at Richmond one time in '87; he got out and cleaned off his windshield, so I thought it was OK. I don't guess it was."

Burton held off Elliott Sadler for the win while Geoffrey Bodine finished third. Las Vegas native Kurt Busch finished fourth after leading late in the race and 2001 Daytona 500 winner Michael Waltrip was fifth. Marlin finished eighth.

Gordon, who had held the lead for 18 laps before Marlin put a fender on him, was surprisingly understanding considering he had just lost his chance at a third Daytona 500 win.

"I should have just given up when (Marlin) got beside me and still had a battle and a shot to win the thing," Gordon, who finished ninth, said. "Unfortunately, that caution came out and me and Sterling knew how important that last restart was, and he got a jump on me.

"I tried to block him and messed up both of our days."

But they helped make Burton's day. The 40-year-old from South Boston, Va., made up for his 2001 Daytona 500, when he led the most laps (53) but finished 35th after getting involved in a late-race accident.

The last five laps Sunday were the only ones Burton led all day.

"Today, we had some luck," Burton said. "We were in the right place at the right time."

For Burton, who struggled in the mid '90s while Bill Davis was building his race team, the win was so overwhelming that he had to take an extra victory lap to gather his emotions.

"I had a bunch of tears in my eyes," he said. "Being a part of (the Daytona 500), being in that Victory Circle, actually being able to make that lap, getting high-fived by all our different teams members ... there's nothing that you could experience that's going to top that."

The win was equally sweet for Davis, who has fielded cars in the NASCAR Winston Cup Series since 1993.

"I've struggled a lot with wanting to understand what it took to earn respect in this garage and maybe to be taken seriously," Davis said. "I don't feel like maybe we've always gotten the respect that we should.

"I feel pretty good right now."

Sunday's race, the first at a restrictor-plate track under the new aerodynamic rules NASCAR instituted during the winter, turned out better than the sanctioning body could have hoped.

Although the 20 lead changes among 12 drivers fell far short of the 43 among 14 drivers in last year's race, there was plenty of two-wide and three-wide racing to hold the attention of the estimated 220,000 spectators.

The race featured nine caution periods for 38 laps. Although 27 of the 43 cars were involved in some sort of fender-bender, no drivers were injured and all but 12 cars were running at the finish.

While the fans may have enjoyed the action, not all the participants were overjoyed with the close racing.

"It was a wreckfest," Jeff Burton said.

"If they were looking for a joke, they got one," James Ince, crew chief for Johnny Benson, said. "They had all Dodges and Fords up front like they needed (but) it's a crying shame that with five laps to go, you've got a wrecked car (Benson's) running ninth."

Pole-sitter Jimmie Johnson was one of 18 cars involved in a melee on lap 149 but he was able to continue. The rookie finished 15th, one lap off the pace.

Pre-race favorite Dale Earnhardt Jr. recovered from an early blown tire and got back in the top 10 late in the race before another blown tire sent him to the garage area for repairs to a broken brake caliper. He finished 29th.

Tony Stewart, on the other hand, never had a chance to contend for his first Daytona 500 win. His day ended after just two laps because of a blown engine.