Talledaga 500

It was another white-knuckle weekend at Talladega Superspeedway. Todd Bodine (66), Jeff Burton (99) and Busch lead the way with Ward Burton, Earnhardt Jr. (8) and Mark Martin (6) in close pursuit

Todd Bodine (66), Jeff Burton (99) and Busch lead the way with Ward Burton, Earnhardt Jr. (8) and Mark Martin (6) in close pursuit

Mark qualified the Viagra® (sildenafil citrate) Taurus fifth to start Sunday's race. He was pleased with the car after practice on Saturday and believed he would be competitive if he could avoid the "big wreck" that everyone anticipated.

Mark moved into third place and ran single-file with the leaders for the first 30 laps. As some of the drivers behind him became impatient and decided to make a move to the front, he was shuffled back as far as 28th by lap 60. The crew made a small wedge adjustment during the first pit stop since the car was loose in traffic. The adjustment seemed to help since Mark drafted his way back up front. He earned five bonus points on lap 101 for leading the race before he pitted on lap 102. A 15.14-second stop kept Mark in the lead draft and on his way to a good finish.

Mark took the lead again with 42 laps to go and led for four laps before Ricky Rudd got by him on lap 146. The team made their final pit stop of the day on lap 152 and made another slight wedge adjustment to improve the handling for the final 36 laps.

With eight laps to go, Mark was in fifth place in a single-file draft behind Tony Stewart, Roush teammate Kurt Busch, Johnny Benson and Bobby Hamilton. The drivers stayed in line until the final lap of the race. Each of the drivers seemed to make their own attempt to overtake Stewart. Mark came across the finish line four-wide while Hamilton claimed his first race of the season and Mark held on to finish fourth. It was the team's first top-five finish of the season, which moved them up to 20th in the Winston Cup point standings. The most amazing part of the race was that the "big wreck" never happened. In fact, there were no caution flags for the entire race. In addition, three of the four Roush teams finished in the top-10.

"I'm so glad nobody was hurt out there today," Mark said. "Every one of the those drivers out there deserves a gold medal. Everybody was careful and did a good job. I'm glad to have this race behind us and I'm thrilled to finish as well as we did. It felt good to have a competitive car and good pit stops all day. This team was outstanding today and it is such a relief to put this race behind us with a good result."

"Mark and the team had a great day," Jack Roush said. "He had a chance to race competitively and he took advantage of that."

Next weekend the Winston Cup teams head west again for the 10th race of the season.

Coming off his first top-five finish of the 2001 Winston Cup season, Mark is pleased to have Talladega behind him and move on to one of his favorite tracks, California. Mark has been a fan of the two-mile facility since the inaugural race in 1997. He had a shot at the win that year, but fell short on fuel mileage before he crossed the finish line. He made up for it one year later with a trip to Victory Lane in 1998.

"I really like that track," Mark said. "It is very similar to the other tracks I enjoy like Michigan, Charlotte and Las Vegas. It is very wide and there is plenty of room to pass. It won't be anything like what we just went through in Talladega. This will be real racing as opposed to just riding around waiting for an accident."

Mark will be driving JR-85 in California, the same car he ran in Atlanta last month. He was pleased with the car's performance and handling in Atlanta until engine problems ended their day early.

"The Viagra® team has given me a lot of good cars this year," Mark said. "We just haven't always had the luck to go along with them. I think if we could make it out of Talladega in one piece that is a sign that our luck has changed for the better. We are just barely 100 points out of 10th place in the points. It's certainly not where we want to be, but a good race in California could make a big difference in the points for us. We just need to get the momentum going. We had good races at Vegas and Texas, but then we had problems after that. The next seven tracks coming up, including California, are really good tracks for us. I expect good things from this team in the upcoming weeks."