Martin blows engine, loses golden opportunity

KANSAS CITY, Kan. -- Mark Martin has never ventured far from taking a philosophical view of his best chance at a NASCAR Winston Cup championship in more than 10 years.

That temperament served him well after his No. 6 Viagra Ford's engine blew up with 17 laps to go, knocking him from a sure top-10 finish and retention of his point lead. Martin ended up 25th in the race and fell to second in the standings, 11 points behind new leader Jimmie Johnson.

"I thought we were gonna finish this bad, but because we were gonna run sorry," Martin said. "We were looking at a real sweet finish there, but we couldn't make it all the way. It just made up its mind that it wasn't gonna go that far and it didn't.

MARK MARTIN  •  Driver Page

"It's not because we abused any of our stuff. We babied that thing all weekend."

Martin's dilemma -- which leaves him seven races in which to overcome Johnson and hold off no less than Tony Stewart, Kansas winner Jeff Gordon, Sterling Marlin, Rusty Wallace and Ryan Newman -- was echoed by Roush Racing teammates Jeff Burton and Kurt Busch.

"I didn't think mine would (blow) because I had such a high gear," Martin said. "We turned under 9,000 (RPM) all day -- we really babied our stuff."

Burton, who also spent a good bit of time in the top 10, blew up and finished 29th while Busch, after an extended stay in the garage area, came back out and ended up 31st.

Only Matt Kenseth, who finished seventh, escaped the engine woes.

"That was one of those things where you run a certain package and run a certain RPM," Kenseth said. "Some of them maybe ran more than they should have in practice, I don't know. We tried to baby it most of the weekend and save it for the race."

PROTECTION ONE 400  •  Race results  •  Driver standings

Four of the top-five positions in the points changed Sunday, with Johnson's 10th-place effort jumping him over Martin and Gordon's win moving him past Marlin into fourth.

"Other people had trouble too," Martin said of Marlin's wreck on lap 148 that relegated him to 33rd. "Until the last race, people are gonna have trouble."

Then he turned philosophical again.

"We will battle until the end, but I don't know if that will be a battle for first or not," Martin said. "But, we will battle to the finish."

Martin's biggest disappointment came in 1990, when he was penalized 46 points early in the season, then lost the championship to Dale Earnhardt by 26 points. From 1989 to 2000 he finished between second (three times) and eighth in the championship every year.

"When it comes to competition and getting your heart broken, I'm an eternal pessimist," Martin said. "That's just how I operate. This business has dealt me some very cruel and heartbreaking blows and it's not going to this year, because it just won't.

"I'm prepared for whatever happens. I'm so proud of this team and we're gonna bust our butt to win this championship, but if we didn't run another race this year, we've already done more than we probably hoped to accomplish this year by winning that big race at Charlotte -- the win of my life (Coca-Cola 600)."

	Matt Kenseth escaped engine problems Sunday. Credit: Autostock

Despite the Kansas misfire, Martin's competition knows he isn't through.

"Most of the other guys you see up there (in the standings) are gonna have more opportunities, so there's a little bit of sentiment there that you would like to see that (Martin win) happen," 1999 Winston Cup champion Dale Jarrett said. "As far as what makes Mark tick, he's just a competitor -- a tremendous race driver.

"This is what he does and he'll be the first to tell you that he doesn't do a lot of things. This is his business, this is his life and that's what he's made it. He's the ultimate competitor -- he wants to go out and win and do his job, so it's just that competitive fire and spirit inside him that makes him good and that's gonna make him be tough to beat down the stretch."