The 2002 Food City 500

Making the 500th Winston Cup start of his career, Mark drove the No. 6 The 6 car

Viagra® (sildenafil citrate) Ford Taurus to an 11th place finish. The finish capped off a strong run for the No. 6 team, who after struggling with the car’s setup for most of the weekend, were forced to take a provisional and start 38th in Sunday’s Food City 500, the 31st Cup race for Mark at Bristol Motor Speedway.

The yellow flag dropped 14 times on the day, with the first coming only four laps into the race. Still, Mark was able to avoid each of the accidents to move on the 11th place run. Mark cracked the top 25 for the first time in the day on lap 59 and was running in that same position when the fourth caution of the day came out on lap 80 when the No. 1 car spun out on turn three. The No. 6 team, who had pitted on lap 44, opted to stay on the track and when the other cars were done pitting, Mark found himself running in 4th place.

Mark kept the car running in the top 10 for the next 35 laps and was running in 10th place when the next caution broke on lap 115. With the car starting to push, Mark brought the No. 6 Viagra® Ford Taurus in for four fresh tires, fuel and an air pressure adjustment. He returned to the field in 24 position, as all of the cars did not come in for a stop.

Caution came out again just a few laps later when the No. 40 got tangled up with the back of the No. 10. Mark stayed out and moved up to 18th where the No. 6 was running when the seventh caution of the day came out on lap 157 when the No. 24 car lost control. Mark stayed out and when the field went green on lap 167 the No. 6 was running strong and in second place.

Mark was closing the gap between himself and the leading No. 8 car when the ninth caution of the day came out on lap 210. The No. 6 team came in for four tires and rear-end adjustments. An impressive stop of 14.20 seconds sent Mark back out in 11th place, first of all the cars that pitted.

Mark quickly broke back in the top-10 and was running in ninth place when the 10th caution of the day came out on lap 281. Again the No. 6 Viagra® racing team came in for four tires and a rear-end adjustment. Another impressive stop of 14.25 seconds sent Mark back out in sixth position when the field went green with 210 laps to go in the 500 lap affair.

Mark Martin

Mark had dropped back to 12 place when the No. 21 car spun out on lap 342, causing the 11th caution of the day. With the car getting harder to drive Mark came into the pits, again taking four tires and making adjustments to the rear of the car. A 15.43-second stop sent the No. 6 back out in 12th. After getting caught up in lapped traffic, Mark was running 14th when the 13th caution of the day came out. The No. 6 team came in for their last stop of the day, taking on right side tires and making another rear-end adjustment. A costly stop of 9.25 sent Mark back out in 13th position with 86 laps to go.

The No. 6 dropped back all the way to 15th position by lap 436, but was able to start powering back up the field, passing the No. 4 car on lap 445 and teammate Jeff Burton on lap 459. By lap 475 Mark had moved into 11th position, where he battled the No. 29 car for the last 25 laps of the race, before moving on to the 11th place finish. Roush teammate Kurt Busch went on to win the race, taking the first checkered flag of his Winston Cup career.

"Mark was not real happy with the car in practice," said owner Jack Roush. "But Ben Leslie (crew chief) and the guys really did a nice job working on the car all day and getting him out of the pits in good shape and helping the No. 6 to a good finish. We’ll look forward to coming back for the night race."

"I’d obviously like a little better finish," said Mark after the race. "But the car wasn’t very good early in the week. We were able to make big improvements by race time and go on to a good finish. We tried to test the car here a couple of weeks ago, but got rained out. I really think that put us a little behind the eight ball and we had to start at the back of the field and it’s a battle to the front, especially at Bristol."

"The guys did a really good job today," said Leslie. "We had good stops and Mark did a great job driving the car. I’d also like to congratulate Kurt (Busch) and the No. 97 team on the win."

The car was slow off the truck on Friday and struggled in the first practice session and in qualifying. The No. 6 team worked with the car’s setup and by the final practice on Saturday, Mark was able to post times that were as good as 2/3 of the field. By race time, the car was running the best it had all weekend.

The strong run moves Mark into eighth place in the Winston Cup points standings, joining all three of the other Roush reams in the top-10. Mark has finished no worse than 11th in four of the six races this season.

Next week NASCAR takes a break for the Easter holiday, before returning to action at the Texas Motor Speedway on April 7.