Transmission woes spoil W. Burton's run

RICHMOND, Va. -- Ward Burton was whizzing along Sunday at Richmond International Raceway, speed-writing a fairy tale.

Ward Burton stands over his car in the garage at Richmond.

Thousands of his closest bleary-eyed friends were in the stands, rooting for the native Virginian, and he was giving them plenty of ammunition.

He'd teased them scarcely 12 hours before. After starting on the pole, Burton had led 62 of Saturday night's 66 laps before the Pontiac Excitement 400 was suspended because of rain.

And the trend continued Sunday under blue skies and sunshine. Burton's No. 22 Dodge either led or lurked in the top five as the race reached the halfway point.

But on lap 230 -- while running in the top five -- his engine appeared to blow on the backstretch. It happened two laps after the day's eighth of a track-record 14 cautions -- this one a five-car mess in turn 3 -- and Burton's black and gold car limped into the garage almost unnoticed.

The diagnosis: A blown transmission.

"It's a real shame," said owner Bill Davis. "The transmission casing cracked and broke the drive shaft. It's something internal with the transmission. It was in fourth gear and Ward was digging and boom, no vibration or anything. It just broke. That's about as freak as it gets. These things never break in fourth gear."

"It's hard for me to understand how a transmission breaks as much as those guys work on them," Burton said. "We had two incidences of it last year, but that's the first time it's happened this year."

One major repair later, Burton returned to the track on lap 263. He finished 36 laps down, not what he'd expected when he captured his first pole since 1999 on Friday, in the first short-track car built entirely by Bill Davis Racing. Even more grating, he ended the day having led a race-high 125 laps.

"It's a shame," he said. "The guys have been really working hard, and we could have won this race [Sunday]."

It all echoed a frustrating trend: Highlights have been harder to come by since Burton's season-opening win in the Daytona 500, but there was a silver lining to Sunday's mechanical failure. Burton entered the day 14th in the Winston Cup points standings. He leaves Richmond in the same position.

"We need to validate what we did in Daytona," Davis said. "We've had some pretty good cars and we've had some cars that weren't so good. We certainly haven't put up any numbers like we need to."

"Nobody's giving up on this team, and we still have a lot of good things to look forward to," Burton said. "But a disappointing day."