Newman wins NAPA 250 at Michigan
By Dave Rodman, Turner Sports Interactive
August 20, 2001
11:04 AM EDT (1504 GMT)
BROOKLYN, Mich. -- Ryan Newman held off NASCAR Busch Series point leader Kevin Harvick Saturday afternoon to win the NAPAonline.com 250 at Michigan International Speedway, his first career Busch Series victory in only his ninth start.
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Ryan Newman celebrates.
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Newman dominated the race, leading all but six of 125 laps of the two-mile oval. His only concern came when the fourth caution of the day flew at lap 112 for debris near the pit exit. But he pulled away from Harvick and third place Jimmy Spencer on the restart.
Spencer fell out with only three laps remaining when his Chevrolet’s engine failed.
Newman’s No. 02 ALLTEL Ford averaged 139.557 mph and was 1.345 seconds ahead of Harvick’s No. 2 ACDelco Chevrolet. Tony Raines in the No. 33 Aleve Chevrolet, Jimmie Johnson in the No. 92 Excedrin Chevrolet and Mike McLaughlin in the MBNA Pontiac rounded out the top-five.
Mike Skinner in a Chevrolet, Elton Sawyer in a Ford, Jason Keller and Tim Fedewa in Chevrolets and Jeff Burton in a Ford finished sixth through 10th.
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This was Newman's first career Busch Series victory.
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“It feels great to do this at Michigan, which is very close to home and with so many Penske employees here,” said Newman, 23, of South Bend, Ind. “When that caution came out with 15 to go I said, ‘Uh-oh.’ Fortunately we were the fastest car all day long.
“It was a lot of hard work by the entire crew. To win in our ninth start is pretty awesome since Penske Racing had never prepared Busch cars. We started off Happy Hour yesterday with a struggle to get a good balance. We worked on it and worked on it and finally got it happy by the end of practice.”
Newman, who plans a full Winston Cup schedule in 2002 for Penske, finished fifth here in June in the Kmart 400 NASCAR Winston Cup race. He is running selected Busch, Cup and ARCA RE/MAX Series races this season to prepare for a Raybestos Rookie of the Year campaign in 2002.
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Greg Biffle
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With his second place finish, Harvick solidified his point lead. Greg Biffle, who came into the race in second, was involved in a four-car accident on the sixth lap with Skinner, Kevin Lepage and Randy LaJoie and was the first car out. He unofficially fell to third in the standings, 304 points out of the lead. Keller moved into second, 236 points behind Harvick.
“I feel bad for the guys,” Biffle said. “They built me a good car and we were fast all weekend. I think some guys just got racy on lap four -- it was awful early to be bumping and grinding, but that’s just racing and next week we’ll try harder. That car is ruined so we’ll just load it up and go to Bristol.”
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