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© St. Petersburg Times, published May 7, 2002
Robbie Reiser, crew chief for Matt Kenseth's No. 17 Ford, fretted all Saturday night about the repairs he knew the car needed, but that he hated to make.
Time-consuming changes.
But if Kenseth remains a Winston Cup championship contender late into the season, the team will look back at Sunday's choreographed fix-it job and smile.
Kenseth rallied from 42nd place, two laps down, to finish sixth in the rain-delayed Pontiac Excitement 400 at Richmond International Raceway. Even better, he moved up one place to second in points, 132 behind leader Sterling Marlin.
"The guys did a phenomenal job repairing that car with all the stuff that was broken on it," Reiser said. "They've shown they want to win this championship and they're in the battle."
In the 66 laps run Saturday, before rain delayed the finish for a day, Kenseth played bumper cars with Steve Park's No. 1 Chevy.
The contact led to a loose exhaust pipe and damaged brake line. When Kenseth was about to come to pit road, the race was stopped.
Unable to work on the car during a red flag, Reiser stewed into early morning about how to fix the damage and how many laps it would cost Kenseth. He worked out a plan.
As the race resumed with yellow-flag warmup laps, Kenseth came to pit road, where the car was jacked up so two crew members could slide underneath to make repairs.
Back on the track for the green flag, Kenseth was able to compete with the leaders. With 160 laps to go, he was back on the lead lap in 23rd place.
"We had a lot of problems, but we overcame all of them," Kenseth said. "I would have liked to finish better because I thought our car was better than a sixth-place car. But I guess I can't complain."
Several times this season Kenseth has overcome adversity to post top-10 finishes. Twice he started at the rear after changing engines, only to finish fourth at Atlanta and win at Texas. At Martinsville, he rallied from one lap down to finish second.
RUMOR MILL: Ty Norris, executive vice president of Dale Earnhardt Inc., denied reports Park will be released after the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte in three weeks.
"That rumor is very, very false," Norris said.
DEI, which fields Chevrolets for Dale Earnhardt Jr., Michael Waltrip and Park, is evaluating its talent for 2003, Norris said. Decisions will be based on performance.
"If we have good, solid performances, DEI will look the same (in 2003)," Norris said. "The problem is, we as an organization are pretty inconsistent. We have to get better.
"We have a self-imposed deadline. By a certain time we want to see certain things, or we're going to have to make a decision and go 100 miles an hour down that road."
Park, a two-time winner at DEI, has finished no better than 20th in seven races since returning from a severe head injury sustained in September during a BGN race at Darlington.
TIME TO HEAL: Johnny Benson, who broke a rib in a crash in the Busch Grand National race Friday at Richmond, likely will not return in time for The Winston Open on May 18 at Lowe's Motor Speedway. He expects to race in the Coca-Cola 600 May 26.
GRIPING ABOUT GRIP: Drivers were nearly unanimous in their criticism of the sealant used on RIR's surface. The sealant, applied each winter, normally allows for side-by-side racing on the three-quarter mile oval, but this time helped create a wreckfest. Anyone who ventured into the high line lost grip and veered toward the wall.
"If you'd asked me over the winter, "Should they have sealed the race track?' I would certainly have said yes," said Virginia native Jeff Burton, who finished a season-best third. "Sealing the race track is what has made this race track great. Why it didn't work, I don't know."
LIKE RIDING A BIKE: Steve Grissom, who replaced Buckshot Jones in Petty Enterprises' No. 44 Dodge, was eighth, his first top 10 since finishing 10th at Sears Point in June 1998.
-- Information from other news organizations was used in this report.