The Old Dominion 500

Mark and the Viagra® (sildenafil citrate) Racing Team posted a strong run at Martinsville to notch a 10th-place Mark Martinsville

finish in Sunday's Old Dominion 500. The run broke a string of bad luck for the No. 6 Viagra® Racing team, who posted their 18th top-10 run of 2002.

"It was a great run for us, we just never did get track position. We didn't run good enough to get that. We couldn't afford to short-change us on tires or anything, so it was a good run for us. We were pretty competitive over the last half of the race. Long green runs were our friend."

Mark and the team struggled with the car for the first half of the 500-lap race, before settling in for the final 250 laps. Mark didn't break into the top 10 until lap 444, but the veteran hung on the rest of the way, holding off a feverish run by point's leader Tony Stewart in the final laps.

"He was going to have to earn it," said Mark of Stewarts run at the top 10 in the final moments. "He just didn't quite get there and we hung on for the top-10 finish. This Viagra® Racing team will keep fighting until the very end, just like we did today."

The team struggled slightly off the truck running the 16th fastest time in the first practice. By the second practice Mark had the Viagra® Ford Taurus running the seventh fastest time on the track. Mark turned in the 20th fastest lap in qualifying on Friday, where he started the race on Sunday.

The Blue Crew in Action

Once the green flag dropped, Mark patiently worked his way up the field in Sunday's contest. By lap 323 Martin was running in 12th position, where he would run for the next 107 laps before moving to 11th on lap 431. Mark would pass two cars on lap 444 to move into 9th place, before falling back to 10th a few laps later.

The No. 6 Viagra® Ford Taurus would run the remaining 50 laps of the race in the 10th spot, before moving on to the 10th-place finish.

"We ran pretty good the second half of the race," said Mark. "We had a pretty descent last half, so you can't really complain about a top 10 finish. The team worked hard all weekend and we got a pretty good finish out of it."

Points leader Stewart finished 11th, but led in the race and gained one point on Mark in the championship race. Mark is currently just 123 points outside of first place and trails second place Jimmie Johnson by only 41 points.

"We are still in it," said Mark referring to the championship hunt. "We just need some luck, and I mean good luck - we've had all the bad luck we can handle. We didn't help ourselves today, but we didn't hurt it much either. As I've said before, we'll just keep fighting to the end and see what happens."

Mark and the No. 6 Viagra® Racing team will take to the track next week at the Atlanta Motor Speedway for the NAPA 500. Mark has a strong record in Atlanta, posting 16 top-10's and nine top-fives in 33 starts there, including an 8th place finish in the spring.