MOTOR SPORTS: MARTIN KEEPS ON TRUCKIN'.Byline: Jeff Gluck and Louis Brewster Staff Writers FONTANA - As Mark Martin braced for another green-white-checkered finish, he keyed his team radio one last time. His message? ``This is a blast,'' he said. Martin survived another overtime for his second straight NASCAR NASCAR (National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing), organization that sanctions American stock-car races, est. 1948. It held its first race in Daytona Beach, Fla. Craftsman Truck Series victory, winning the Racetickets.com 200 at California Speedway The California Speedway is a two-mile, low-banked, D-shaped oval superspeedway in Fontana, California, similar to that of "sister track" Michigan International Speedway. It is located approximately 40 miles east of Los Angeles on the site of the former Kaiser Steel mill. on Friday night. The win made Martin the first driver to win a Nextel Cup The NASCAR NEXTEL Cup Series is NASCAR's top racing series. It was formerly known as the Strictly Stock Series (1949), Grand National Series (1950-1971), and the Winston Cup Series (1972-2003). , Busch, Craftsman Truck and IROC IROC International Race Of Champions IROC Independent Rental Owners Council IROC Independent Rental Owners Committee IROC Instantaneous Rate of Change IROC Integrated Repair Operations Center (Sprint) IROC Intrusion-Resistant Optical Cable series race at the same track. ``It was vintage Mark,'' team owner Jack Roush Jack Roush (born April 19, 1942) is the founder, CEO, and co-owner along with John Henry of Roush Fenway Racing, a NASCAR team headquartered in Concord, North Carolina, and is Chairman of the Board of Roush Enterprises. said. ``Mark is absolutely at the top of his game.'' Martin passed Todd Bodine Todd Bodine (born February 27, 1964 in Chemung, New York) is a stock car racer. Todd is the younger brother of former racers Geoff Bodine and Brett Bodine. Bodine won the 2006 NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series championship while driving the #30 Lumber Liquidators/Germain Toyota. with 17 laps remaining and looked like he was cruising toward an easy win, but Mike Wallace Mike Wallace may refer to:
That set up a green-white-checkered finish, and Martin held off Bodine by 0.131 seconds. ``I knew he was going to be trying hard back there,'' Martin said. ``He made me work for it tonight.'' Bodine had been penalized pe·nal·ize tr.v. pe·nal·ized, pe·nal·iz·ing, pe·nal·iz·es 1. To subject to a penalty, especially for infringement of a law or official regulation. See Synonyms at punish. 2. in the opening laps for jumping a restart, but worked his way from 34th place to the front. Teammate Ted Musgrave followed Bodine, creating an identical top three running order to the season-opening race last week at Daytona. That race also ended in an overtime finish. ``Have you ever seen the movie Groundhog Day?'' Musgrave joked. ``It's like, man, didn't we just do this a couple days ago?''Fortunately for the full-time truck series drivers, Martin is only scheduled to run five more races this season. His full-time commitment to the Nextel Cup Series and running a total of 56 races in four series don't allow for much more. Bodine, for one, wished Martin could stick around. ``I wish Mark was racing with us every week,'' Bodine said. ``When you're racing a competitor that good, it only makes you better.'' Pole-sitter David Reutimann and Jack Sprague rounded out the top five. --Kurt Busch takes pole: Could it be California Speedway is replacing Las Vegas Motor Speedway Las Vegas Motor Speedway, located in Clark County, Nevada, just outside Las Vegas, is a 1,200 acre (4.9 km²) complex of four different tracks for automobile racing. The complex is owned by Speedway Motorsports, Inc., which is headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina. as the favorite for NASCAR's Busch brothers? There's not much of a chance, considering Kurt and Kyle grew up in Nevada. But given their performances at Fontana, there's always an outside chance. Kurt opened what he called ``the regular season'' of the Nextel Cup Series by winning the pole for Sunday's Auto Club 500 with a lap of 38.485 seconds at 187.086 mph around the two-mile superspeedway. It was a shade over the track record of 38.248 set last year by Kurt's younger brother Kyle. Kyle added to his Fontana record later in the year when he won the Sony HD 500, his first Cup victory. Kurt secured his first California win in 2002. ``I've never gotten many poles (four), so this is a great way to start,'' said Kurt Busch, who joined the Penske Racing South Miller Lite team at the conclusion of the 2005 season after Rusty Wallace's retirement. ``These guys are wonderful. Rusty gave us a good setup to start with, and we polished it up a little bit. Roy (McCauley, crew chief) took it from there.'' Greg Biffle, the defending race winner, was second fastest in a Ford at 38.671 seconds. CAPTION(S): photo Photo: Mark Martin (6) leads Todd Bovine during the Racetickets.com 200 at California Speedway. Todd Warshaw/Getty Images |
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