 "Photo: AP")
NASCAR visited its oldest living track on Sunday, the 0.526 mile Martinsville Speedway in Virginia. Not only is the track the oldest, it is also the shortest on the 36-race NASCAR Nextel Cup Schedule. The track usually provides very exciting racing, and it did not disappoint in the second race for the Car of Tomorrow.
Goody's Cool Orange 500 winner Jimmie Johnson was the slowest of 43 drivers in Saturday's final practice, and his chances did not look good for being competitive in Sunday's race. Dale Earnhardt Jr. was the fastest in that practice session, and it looked as if he would take home his first Martinsville grandfather clock trophy. Earnhardt and homestate favorite Denny Hamlin dominated most of the race up until a red flag for rain on lap 358. The race was delayed by about an hour due to torrential downpour. When the race resumed, Jeff Gordon took the lead away from Earnhardt as his car began to fade.
"I was banking on the rain to end the race," Earnhardt told The Associated Press. "We used up our car too much, and I'm proud to finish fifth, but I still think we didn't finish anywhere near this team deserved to finish today."
Jeff Gordon's car slowed on the backstretch and appeared to have either blown an engine or dropped a cylinder. However, the car locked up the brakes extremely hard, a regular occurrence at Martinsville, where brakes are more important than on any other track due to the drastic decrease in speed needed for the straightaways. Gordon fell from the lead back to 11th place but worked his way back to the front to battle with teammate Jimmie Johnson for the win. He bumped and banged with Johnson for about 30 laps but was not able to overtake his young protégé teammate and crossed the finish line one half of a car length behind in a similar look to last week's finish at Bristol.
"He didn't give me much room," Gordon said. "He really blocked me a lot, but he did what he had to do. I'm happy for him and Hendrick Motorsports, but I am very disappointed, because I thought we could've won."
Contact came early and often on Sunday. Bobby Labonte locked up the brakes on his No. 43 Cheerios Dodge hard going into turn two and slammed the wall with a driver's side impact. Fortunately, he walked away, but it was the first major test of the Car of Tomorrow in a hard crash during racing conditions. Neither the controversial splitter nor the futuristic rear wing devices were broken during the crash.
Another notable incident came when Tony Raines' No. 96 Chevrolet made contact with Juan Montoya in turn one and backed into the wall hard. A loud, dramatic in-car camera shot showed the impact directly on the rear of the car. Like Labonte's crash, this crash also did not break the rear wing device that is attached to the deck lid.
The Nextel Cup Series takes the Easter weekend off and will head to Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth for the Samsung 500 on April 15, where the regular cars will return to the track following a two-race hiatus.
Additional reporting by The Associated Press.
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