Marlin adds to point lead with strong Pocono run

LONG POND, Pa. -- NASCAR Winston Cup car owner Chip Ganassi has won enough championships to know what it takes, and at what point in a season it's appropriate to talk title.

	Sterling Marlin led 106 laps on Sunday en route to nearly doubling his lead in the point standings.

But Ganassi's success has come in open wheel cars, not Winston Cup, and with his lead driver, Sterling Marlin, looking at just a 55-point lead in the standings on Mark Martin heading into Sunday's Pennsylvania 500, there was some cause to wonder if Marlin was truly a contender, or a pretender to the throne.

Those thought evaporated Sunday. Despite faltering in the shortened race's stretch and missing a chance at a $150,000 NASCAR Winston Leader Bonus, Marlin led 106 laps and finished third.

In doing so, he virtually doubled his point lead, unofficially to 106 points on Martin. It continued a remarkable skein of consistency for the Columbia, Tenn., driver.

Marlin has scored 16 top-15 finishes and 11 top-10 finishes in 19 races this season. He is also the only driver to remain in the top-10 in the point standings since the 2001 Daytona 500.

"We led the most laps and gained some points," Marlin said. "I wish we could have won, but that was all we had."

PENNSYLVANIA 500 • Unofficial Results • Unofficial Standings

Despite that, Marlin leads the point standings following the 19th consecutive event. Ganassi said despite the roll his team is on, there's no guarantee somebody else won't do the same.

"Mathematically somebody could score as many points in the second half of the season as we did in the first half," he said. "I guess we could fall out of every race (so) I don't understand why everyone wants to talk about the championship when we've got half of the season left.

"There's a lot of racing left to go, and are we going to change the way we do things? No. We're going to race 'em hard every weekend. We haven't changed anything since the beginning of the season. I don't think we're going to change anything now. We can always get better and make small adjustments."

Marlin was singing the same tune after Sunday's efforts, which left him behind only winner Bill Elliott and second-place Kurt Busch. They were the only men in the top-10 in points to gain ground on the leader.

"They've (the Ganassi Racing team) have been working real hard, and I think we're back in business," Marlin said. "It was a good points day for us. We finally gained some on Mark Martin (51 points)."

Martin finished 13th, and he wasn't the only frontrunner to lose ground to Marlin. Third- place Jimmie Johnson was 15th; fourth man Jeff Gordon was 12th.

	Sterling Marlin has led the point standings for the past 19 races. Credit: Autostock

Rusty Wallace, who came into the race fourth in the points, was involved in an accident on the first lap, finished 40th and dropped four spots, to eighth.

In the last nine point races, Marlin had only two top-10s. But with the exception of a last-place finish at Infineon Raceway, no finish in that time was worse than 24th.

"I don't know if the 40 team has to pick up any to stay on top," Ganassi said. "We've just got to run the way we're most comfortable running. You can't be in the business and change this and that in midseason.

"We're not going to start putting the pressure on Sterling Marlin and acting like we're nervous and stupid. We're going to run like we have been running. When it comes time to count the points at the end of the year, we're going to be wherever we deserve to be."

Ganassi said Sunday's run was only one more indication of why he feels -- even though you have to force him to talk about it -- that his team is a championship favorite.

"On every team there's some star," he said. "The star on our team is our performance on the track. In this business, everybody has an ego. On this team everybody puts the team in front of their own accomplishments."