Thank you for posting this race. I went to most of the Martinsville races in the 90's and 00's and I love watching them again. Almost feels like I'm there again at the race. Gotta love it!
I was at this race. One thing I just remembered was that Geoff Bodine was really good at Martinsville when I first started going there when I was in my late teens and I saw him win a couple races there. Then Rusty took over as the guy to beat until Gordon started dominating. And also Waltrip was greater there than anybody I've ever seen win at the Paper Clip but that was on TV. Great track to watch a race at and like my buddy said at a qualifying and practice day that I took him to "I didn't think they went that fast and could make it around the corner".😅
This race is prime example of why they never should have started that lucky dog crap. It was so exciting to see these guys fight tooth and nail just to stay on that lead lap. Being the first car a lap down is an awful lot like being the first loser.
They have this rule (for those who don't know) because you once were allowed in NASCAR to race back to the caution flag. The field was not frozen at the moment of caution. NASCAR needed tech to advance before this started. Drivers would race back and sometimes the leader would slow down to give people a lap back (like a teammate) - but drivers abused this system and started passing drivers for position. This jeopardized the safety of drivers in crashed cars. So that tooth and nail battle almost killed some folks in the 2000's
@@josephjohn3857 They didn't just race when the caution came out. Guys used to just fight the leader to stay on the lead lap. You could have still left the rules alone without racing back to the line. It lends to making races easier to win when a guy can get lapped and un lapped several times in a race where you used to be SOL if you got lapped due to your pace. If a top 5 car had issues and got lapped back then he could usually pass the leader and earn it back. If you are too slow to stay on the lead lap you don't need to be put back on it repeatedly.
