DOVER, Del. -- More than $500,000 was spent to resurface the track here, but it didn't take the monster out of the "Monster Mile."
Yesterday, the monster conquered all of the NASCAR hot shots vying for the Winston Cup championship, leaving the Delaware 500 victory to journeyman Ricky Rudd, a Virginian who turned 30 Friday.
After Dale Earnhardt, Tim Richmond, Darrell Waltrip, Harry Gant and Bill Elliott were knocked out of the 4-hour, 20-minute grind, only three were left on the lead lap -- Rudd, Neil Bonnett and Kyle Petty.
But Rudd's Motorcraft Ford was much stronger than the Chevrolet of Bonnett or the Petty car, the Wood Brothers Ford. Rudd coasted to a 5.08-second victory.
Rudd, who nearly won the short-track race at Richmond a week ago, won his longest oval race ever. He has won twice at the Riverside, Calif., road course, twice at the half-miler in Martinsville, Va., and once at the short track in Richmond.
"I had that race at Richmond won, but when they restarted the race near the end, it was into piles of oil-dry (compound) and two of us spun into the wall," said Rudd. "The biggest thing I had to do today was to block that disappointment out of my mind and concentrate on this race."
Rudd still had to overcome some adversity yesterday. At the 121st lap, all the leaders hurried into the pits at the same time.
"That pace car must have been running better than 100 m.p.h.," said Rudd. "I got boxed in, and before I could get out of the pits it was already going by, and Bobby Allison and Terry Labonte and I all got put down a lap for passing it."
But Rudd hung in and led the last 92 laps to register his sixth victory since he started on NASCAR's major circuit 11 years ago.
"We ran good all day," said Rudd, "but I know it would have been a different thing if (Geoff) Bodine and Richmond were still around at the end. Those Chevrolets have 100-hp more than our Ford."
Richmond, who inherited the Virginia victory a week ago when Rudd's luck failed, was going for his third straight triumph. (He had won at Darlington, S.C., the previous week.) But just 11 miles into the race, he had a tire pierced by debris and slammed into the wall. He was 115 laps down when the completely rebuilt car was able to return to the track, and Richmond was still running at the end, but 201 miles behind Rudd.
Earnhardt, the points leader, also hit the wall 334 miles into the marathon and returned after repairs, but trailed by 68 miles and finished 21st. Bodine had the fastest car but his engine failed at the halfway mark.
Waltrip had to have his transmission replaced when it went up in smoke at Mile 132. He got back in the chase, however, and was only 10 laps down at the end.
The effort by Waltrip's team allowed him to close the point gap between himself and Earnhardt. He picked up 16 points and remains third in the chase with 3,185, 192 points behind. Richmond lost 20 points, dropping 138 behind, but still is in second. Earnhardt has 3,498 to Richmond's 3,360 with six races remaining. Rudd moved up a notch from sixth to fifth in the standings behind Bobby Allison.
Altogether, 19 in the 40-car field failed to finish the race, which was viewed by an estimated 50,000 fans.
Delaware 500
1 Ricky Rudd
2 Neil Bonnett
3 Kyle Petty
4 Buddy Baker
5 Dave Marcis
6 Joe Ruttman
7 Alan Kulwick
8 Tommy Ellis
9 Bobby Hillin
10 Morgan Shepherd
11 Mark Martin
12 Richard Petty
13 Rusty Wallace
14 darrell Waltrip
15 Buddy Arrington
16 Michael Waltrip
17 Johnny Coy Jr.
18 Joe Booher
19 Terry Labonte
20 Bobby Allison
21 Dale Earnhardt
22 Ken Schrader
23 Chet Phillip
24 Jimmy Means
25 Eddie Bierschwale
26 Tim Richmond
27 Bill Elliot
28 Geoff Bodine
29 Brian Baker
30 howard Rose
31 Cliff Hucul
32 Rick Wilson
33 Bobby Waywak
34 Gary Fedewa
35 Harry Gant
36 Jerry Bowman
37 J.D. McDuffie
38 Roy Lee Hendrick
39 Tommy Crozier
40 Mike Potter
Time Of Race: 4 hours, 22 minutes, 24 seconds
Average Speed : 114.329 mph
Margin Of Victory: 6 seconds