Monday, July 29, 2002
Elliott passes Marlin for record 5th Pocono win
The Associated Press
LONG POND, Pa. - Bill Elliott stalked Sterling Marlin throughout the race, finally passed him with 21 laps left Sunday and took the crash- and rain-delayed Pennsylvania 500 to set a record with his fifth career victory at Pocono Raceway.
“It seems like the guy who was out in front had the advantage,” Elliott said. “I gave it everything I had.”
The win was the first on the mountaintop since 1989 for the 46-year-old driver from Dawsonville, Ga. It also was the 42nd in the career of the 1988 NASCAR champion, who went winless in six years as an owner-driver before selling his team and joining Evernham Motorsports last season.
The race turned into a marathon of 6 hours, 35 minutes, 51 seconds because of an accident involving Steve Park on the first lap. Park was not injured in the crash, which forced a delay of 1:05 while repairs were made to the infield retaining wall.
Less than a half-hour later, rain caused another red flag, which halted the race for an additional 2:02 after the 27th of 175 laps. The race was halted 25 laps short of its scheduled distance because of darkness.
“I want to thank God for being with me and not getting hurt,” said Park, who missed 12 of 36 races last year while recovering from a head injury. “I was trapped and I tried to stay calm.”
The crash also involved Park's teammate, Dale Earnhardt Jr., Rusty Wallace and Rick Craven.
The accident began when Wallace hit the wall after leaving the first turn on the 2-1/2-mile track. Park attempted to avoid contact, but got sideways and was hit hard by Earnhardt.
“I was on the outside of Rusty ... and he started moving up,” Park said. “I backed off, then he pulled back down like his spotter might have said something was on the outside. I got back up on the outside of him and he just came up on me.”
Said Wallace: “You're supposed to drive the car yourself. I can't put the responsibility on the spotter.”
Park's Chevrolet, pushed across the grass by Earnhardt's, hit the steel wall and was badly crumpled, then flipped twice before coming to rest on its roof. It took course workers several minutes to free Park, who emerged to cheers from a crowd of 100,000.
Marlin dominated the race, leading 106 laps on the triangular-shaped track. But Elliott got by Marlin with a bold move on the high side as the cars approached of the second turn, and drove away.
Still, Elliott praised Evernham and his crew.
“They make it easy to come out here every Sunday and do my job,” Elliott said.
It also was the second win for car owner Ray Evernham, the point man in Dodge's return in 2001 after a 16-year absence from NASCAR's top division. As a crew chief, Evernham guided Jeff Gordon to three of his four series championships and the first 47 of his 58 career victories.
Pole-sitter Elliott led 35 laps and beat the Ford of Kurt Busch by 1.721 seconds.
“I was surprised as anybody that he had the pass that easily,” Busch said of Elliott's winning move.
Third was the Dodge of Marlin, followed by the Ford of June Pocono winner Dale Jarrett and rookie Ryan Newman's Ford.
The victory, on the heels of Ward Burton's a week earlier at New Hampshire International Speedway, marked the first back-to-back wins since Dodge returned to NASCAR's top division last season after a 16-year absence.
Elliott broke a tie for Pocono victories with Rusty Wallace, Darrell Waltrip and Tim Richmond.
Franchitti endures demolition derby
VANCOUVER, British Columbia - Dario Franchitti drove away from teammate Paul Tracy on Sunday in a five-lap sprint that capped a Vancouver Molson-Indy race full of crashes and attrition.
Only seven of 18 starters were running at the end of the 100-lap race on the 1.781-mile temporary street course as Franchitti won here for the second time and earned his first victory since July 2001 in Cleveland.
On a restart after Shinji Nakano's crash into a tire barrier scattered debris and brought out the fifth caution of the race, Patrick Carpentier ignited the last and worst crash.
Carpentier, who was running fourth but was on cold tires after a pit stop, spun in front of a pack of cars just nine laps from the end. Bruno Junqueira ran into the back of a braking Adrian Fernandez, sending him into the concrete wall. Alex Tagliani, Carpentier's teammate, also was clipped by another car and hit the wall.
The final two accidents erased the 11-second lead Franchitti had built over Tracy after the Canadian pitted with 15 laps left, leaving the two nose-to-tail when the green flag waved again on lap 96.
“Everything was looking great until that last yellow and the red flag,” Franchitti said. “I was a bit worried on the restart, but I got on it really hard on the restart trying to get a gap from Paul. I don't know if he would have made a challenge and risk our finishing 1-2, but I didn't want to let him get close enough to try.”
FORMULA ONE: Michael Schumacher followed up his record-tying fifth Formula One championship by winning the German Grand Prix to equal another milestone.
It was Schumacher's ninth victory of the season, the fourth time he equaled his own record for the number of wins in a year. Nigel Mansell did it once, in 1992.
Schumacher clinched his fifth season title last Sunday by winning the French Grand Prix.
Juan Pablo Montoya took advantage of a late unscheduled pit stop by Michael's younger brother, Ralf, to move into second place. Montoya finished 10.5 seconds back in his BMW-Williams, strengthening his hold on second place in the season standings.
IRL: Rookie Tomas Scheckter won his first Indy Racing League race in the inaugural Michigan Indy 400 in Brooklyn, Mich.
Red Bull Cheever Racing teammate Buddy Rice, who made his first IRL start, finished 1.703 seconds behind Scheckter.
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Elliott passes Marlin for record 5th Pocono win
