Roush stable enjoys dominating year in 2002

CONCORD, N.C. -- No one in their right mind would've predicted a 10-win NASCAR Winston Cup Series season for Roush Racing in 2002.

Owner Jack Roush literally came back from the dead in the spring, following the crash of a light private aircraft he was flying. His subsequent recovery made anything else in the season pure icing on a 12-layer cake; but the Roush organization's performance was still impressive.

The 36-race season concluded with Mark Martin and his No. 6 Viagra Ford team battling gamely into second in the championship, 38 points behind Tony Stewart, after recording top-10 finishes in the last five races.

Most importantly Martin, 43, revitalized his career with new crew chief Ben Leslie and earned a stirring victory at Lowe's Motor Speedway on his way to his fourth second-place finish in a title chase.

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"I think it shows the dedication of the organization and the people who make up the organization," Martin said. "Everybody knows that we had a down year last season, but we came back -- we never gave up and we all kept fighting and we had the type of year that shows the effort that everyone involved puts into racing."

A couple of Roush's younger drivers showed a return on the potential the owner had cited when he brought them into the fold. Matt Kenseth, 30, led the series with five victories in his No. 17 DeWalt Ford and finished eighth in the championship with longtime crew chief Robbie Reiser.

Winston Cup sophomore Kurt Busch, 24, was paired with veteran crew chief Jimmy Fennig after his and Martin's teams swapped chief mechanics in the off-season.

Busch scored his first series victory in the No. 97 Rubbermaid Ford with an aggressive, calculated move to elbow veteran Jimmy Spencer out of the way at Bristol in the spring. Busch then won three of the last five races to barge into third in the championship, picking up nine spots in the standings in seven races before holding third in the finale.

Only veteran Jeff Burton, who several years earlier had positioned himself as an annual Winston Cup challenger before falling off the scale in 2001-2002, continued to struggle in the No. 99 CITGO Ford. Burton was the only one of the full-time Roush teams that neither won, nor finished in the top 10 in the standings.

In the fall, the organization made a crew chief change, dropping veteran Frankie Stoddard in favor of former Winston Cup championship crew chief Paul Andrews. By the end of the season, when they were together for 10 races, Andrews and Burton already seemed to be making progress, with top-five finishes in two of the last three races.

	Credit: Autostock

Roush's most prolific NASCAR award winner, 2002 Busch Series champion Greg Biffle, had a rough entr?e to Winston Cup racing, failing to qualify for three of the four races he attempted in his Roush equipment. However, Biffle substituted for two veteran Winston Cup teams and was impressive, both in qualifying and in race trim in five races as he prepared for a Raybestos Rookie of the Year run in 2003.

Roush's five teams have already started preparations for 2003 and Martin, for one, forecasts more of the same as was seen in 2002.

"Our teams gave us fast pit stops and we had better handling cars and more horsepower," Martin cited as reasons for the organization's improvement. "That is what racing is about and that is what will get you more competitive. We were very competitive in 2002 and that is a credit to Jack and all of the guys involved that made it happen."