Red-hot Busch wins finale

Mike Harris

Monday, Nov. 18, 2002 | 9:43 a.m.

HOMESTEAD, Fla. -- Tony Stewart won the title, but Las Vegas native Kurt Busch won another race.

Busch came on late Sunday to win the Ford 400 at Homestead-Miami Speedway, but his third victory in the last five events was almost completely overshadowed by the championship battle.

Busch, who started from the pole, finished the season on a roll, charging from 12th to third in the points over the last eight races. The 24-year-old driver, completing his second season, finished 159 points behind Stewart.

The race winner passed rookie Ryan Newman on lap 257 and pulled away to the fourth victory of his career, all this season.

Joe Nemechek finished second, followed by another Roush driver, Jeff Burton, Martin, Jeff Gordon, Newman, Bill Elliott and Jimmie Johnson.

Stewart -- the only driver ever to win a championship while on probation -- didn't earn the title the way he would have liked. He finished 18th Sunday.

That was enough, though, to keep runner-up Mark Martin at bay and win the championship by 38 points.

The often caustic and combative Stewart was uncharacteristically emotional, dabbing at his eyes and mopping his face with a towel before finally climbing from his No. 20 Pontiac.

"We really weren't that good today," Stewart said. "We got a lap down and that was pretty discouraging. I was awful nervous when we lost that lap, so it took a little bit of the pressure off when we got back on the lead lap.

"We never gave up. We never got frustrated with each other on the radio. We did this the way we got here, and that was as a team."

Stewart needed only to finish 22nd or better Sunday to clinch the title, Martin made a contest of it, finishing fourth and forcing Stewart to race hard for all 267 laps on the 1 1/2-mile oval. It just wasn't enough.

"Those guys were just a little bit stronger than us, but what an effort," said Martin, 43, now a four-time series runner-up and never a champion. "The only regret I have is that I could have provided more leadership to this team so we could have scored an extra 100 or 150 this year somewhere along the line -- but we didn't and I couldn't." Martin, who is a teammate of Busch's in the Roush stables, was docked 25 points after NASCAR discovered an unapproved spring on his Roush Racing Ford on Nov. 3 in Rockingham, N.C., or the final difference would have been even closer. An appeal of the penalty was turned down Saturday.

"We made it close," Martin said. "We gained points on the guy three races in a row so, in a way, I wish it wasn't over. I'm as proud of that as anything we did all year long."

Stewart, who has undergone anger management sessions for his fiery temper that has led to fines and probation, reached his nadir in August when he punched a photographer after a bad day in the Brickyard 400.

That brought a total of $60,000 in fines from NASCAR and Home Depot, Stewart's primary sponsor. It also put him under NASCAR's microscope for the rest of the season.

"I still have a hard time believing we've done and accomplished what we've accomplished this year," Stewart said. "We didn't do anything magical. We didn't do anything special, but it was more of a personal victory for our team."

He gave much of the credit for the success to crew chief Greg Zipadelli.

"I practically destroyed this team by midseason, single-handedly, and Zippy was the glue that held everybody together," Stewart said. "Zippy was the friend that got me back on track and got my mindset right to do what we did the rest of the year."

Zipadelli shrugged off the compliment, saying, "We had a tough year, it's been up and down. It was worth it."

Joe Gibbs, who coached the Washington Redskins to three Super Bowl victories, now has two Winston Cup titles. Bobby Labonte, Stewart's teammate, won in 2000.

Stewart, who had won two of three previous races here, started sixth but never contended Sunday, driving a conservative race that saw him fall a lap behind the leaders on lap 192.

He hung in and got the lap back, moving onto the tail of the lead lap by passing then-leader Dale Jarrett on lap 205. He was able to stay ahead of the lead pack and, with the help of a yellow flag on lap 227, remained on the lead lap to the end.

"We've always run so good here. That's why it was such a surprise when the car went off like it did," Stewart said. "Luckily, Zippy did some aggressive changes to fix the thing. We got in the front of the pack again and were able to race the guys in the lead lap ahead of us.

"It wasn't a piece of cake by any means."

Stewart, NASCAR's Rookie of the Year in 1999, has won championships before -- the last in 1997 in the Indy Racing League.

He finished fourth in the points as a rookie, sixth the next year, and a distant second to Gordon a year ago.