"MARTIN TAKES IROC RACE;
EARNHARDT TAKES TITLE"

Published in the Johnson County (Ind.) Daily Journal, Aug. 5, 2000 ©

         Friday's International Race of Champions at the Indianapolis speedway bore more than a passing resemblance to the second annual historic reenactment of some legendary Civil War battle.

         Mark Martin won the battle. Again. Dale Earnhardt won the war. Again.

         In a replay that wasn't quite instant, but was nearly identical to last year's, Martin shot ahead of Earnhardt and the other 10 drivers from NASCAR Winston Cup racing and the Indy Racing League on the eighth lap and charged off to a resounding victory in his blood-red Pontiac Firebird. It was Martin's third straight triumph in IROC at the Brickyard 400 track, which was hosting only its third IROC matchup of identically prepared Firebirds.

         But, in the end, whether they called it deja vu or just same old, same old, the Winston Cup regular and four-time IROC champion from Batesville, Ark., couldn't keep Earnhardt out of his mirrors or away from the cut-glass IROC series trophy for the second straight time.

         "When we got in the lead out there today, I really didn't think he (Earnhardt) could get to second," Martin said shortly after the 40-lap event. "And I ran about one lap and there he was, and I said, 'Well, that's it.'

         "All I could do was try to get away so I wouldn't give him a tow, so I worked on that real hard. I didn't score enough points, but it sure is nice to win races."

         Martin finished 1.3 seconds ahead of Earnhardt's dark-blue Firebird, which still left him three points behind in the overall war for the IROC title. In the aftermath of the Brickyard's version of Second Bull Run, both contenders were more inclined to fire compliments back and forth than verbal cannon balls.

         "Mark Martin runs this race track so great," a smiling Earnhardt commented after the battleground cleared. "He's a tough competitor, and when you beat a guy like that in a series it makes you feel pretty good.

         "It was a great battle all year."

         The four-race series at speedways around the country produced Earnhardt's fourth IROC championship, the same number Martin has in his career. The seven-time Winston Cup champion out of Kannapolis, N. C., was more than happy to settle for that kind of moral victory Friday after having to start last in the 12-car field for the season finale that will be telecast by ABC after today's Brickyard 400.

         "We did what we had to do," he noted, another smile emerging under the most familiar moustache on the NASCAR side of the Mason-Dixon line like a squad of riflemen from a thicket. "We would have liked to have went up and won the race, but, starting where we did, it was a tough feat to get by them guys.

         "Mark did it with ease, it looked like from where I was sitting."

         Martin, for his part, had to take as much satisfaction as he could in doing what no driver had ever done before at Indy -- win three straight races in any annual event there. "That's pretty cool," he said, with a smile as wide as Sherman's march across Georgia. "The trophies look nice in the trophy case, that's all I can tell you."

         What Martin couldn't tell anyone after Friday's race was what it was about the Indy circuit that suited him so well that he had won every IROC race held there so far. "I don't know," he said, with another smile and a tug at the bill of his red racing cap. "It's different than Daytona and Talladega, and I like when they race IROC cars where you have to let off the gas.

         "When you race at Daytona or Talladega, you rely on partners more, so you have less control of the outcome. Here, you don't need a partner; you do the work yourself."

         "I've just been lucky," he finally conceded, though. "That's all it is, just pure luck. Dale Earnhardt is the master, and it's just really an honor for me to be able to race against him."

         Meanwhile, back on the Earnhardt side of the post-IROC front, the same question arose. "That's a good question," the reigning IROC champion responded, like the battle-tested soldier he is. "I knew when he drew the red car, I said, 'Oh, wow, give Mark Martin the best car?'

         "Everybody said the red car's no different from the rest of 'em, but (Eddie) Cheever won in it, and a lot of other guys have raced well in it, so I think that car has a good record and intimidates people, mentally, when someone gets in it."

         Earnhardt quickly added an admission, however, that it was probably more than the car that had the rest of the Indy IROC field seeing red Friday. "It really suited Mark well, and I was impressed by the way he drove the car and drove the race," he said.

         "He ran a great line and just kept being better and better."

         Earnhardt also acknowledged that his ability to challenge Martin had been compromised somewhat by having to fight off first Rusty Wallace, then Tony Stewart in hand-to-hand combat for the runnerup position in the closing laps. "I was just fortunate to hang on," he said.

         For Martin's part, he offered one piece of IROC history that he hoped his Indy streak wouldn't replicate, like scripting a new ending for another Bull Run reenactment. "They had a couple races at California that seemed to go real well for us," recounted Martin, who has won a total of 10 IROC races in his career. "They had a couple at Charlotte, and that went real well; we raced a couple at Darlington, and that went real well.

         "I think we won every time we ran any of those places, and they quit having them at all those places. So, it wouldn't really surprise me if they decided not bring IROC cars back here next year."

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 Copyright 2000 by Jerry Miller ©

 Color photos courtesy of NASCAR

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