Rick Hendrick got his first NASCAR Cup Series victory as an owner 20 years ago at Martinsville. Credit: Autostock
By Dave Rodman, Turner Sports Interactive
April 17, 2004
5:35 PM EDT (2135 GMT)
MARTINSVILLE, Va. -- Geoffrey Bodine will celebrate the 20th anniversary of NASCAR team owner Rick Hendrick's first NASCAR Cup Series victories Sunday at Martinsville Speedway.
Bodine started sixth and finished first in the No. 5 All-Star Racing Chevrolet in the 1984 Sovran Bank 500. Hendrick missed that race due to a family function, but he'll be at Martinsville on Sunday to watch Bodine drive the same car in an honorary pre-race parade lap.
Hendrick, who titled his operation Hendrick Motorsports beginning in 1985 now has 118 victories in the Cup Series, including 10 wins at Martinsville.
"Twenty years ago this race was our first win," Hendrick said. "We showed up at Martinsville with an unsponsored car. It was a pivotal time and a pivotal race because we didn't know if we could make it all the way through the year.
"That was our first win with Geoff Bodine and I think it was our eighth race of the year. It allowed us to go on and get Levi Garrett as a sponsor and I guess the rest is history."
Bodine went on to win two more races that season and in 1986, won the Daytona 500 driving Hendrick's Levi Garrett Chevrolet. Since then, Hendrick has won nine NASCAR championships, including five in the Cup Series, three in the Craftsman Truck Series and the 2003 Busch Series title.
"This is a really neat experience for us to be in the sport for 20 years," Hendrick said. "I feel very fortunate to have accomplished the things that we have."
The luckless Jeff Burton has a spate of bad luck in the spring at Martinsville, and it continued Saturday morning when, in the last 10 minutes of the final Happy Hour practice, Burton spun and hit the Turn 3 wall with his No. 99 Team Caliber Ford.
The impact pancaked the left side of the car and crushed the left rear corner, forcing Roush Racing to pull out a back-up car and Burton to forfeit his 27th starting position for Sunday's Advance Auto Parts 500.
"This is the third year in a row," Burton said. "I just had no brakes. Mark's (Martin) having trouble with brakes (and) we're having trouble with brakes.
"We were on a 35-lap run or something like that and I just lost the brakes. Normally with our systems you can pump the pedal and you'll get a pedal. When I pumped it, I had no pedal.
"I went to get it again and only had rear brakes, so it wheel-hopped and I was along for the ride at that point."
Kirk Shelmerdine, who has started six of seven Nextel Cup Series races in his No. 72 Fords and won $379,017 for running a total of 151 laps in the six starts, thought he would make number seven on Sunday.
But NASCAR's 2004 provisional system confused even the sanctioning body's officials Friday after Bud Pole Qualifying.
Initially, Shelmerdine was awarded the 41st starting position using a provisional start and Todd Bodine's No. 98 Ford was a DNQ.
But after reviewing its statistics, NASCAR determined that Shelmerdine, who has yet to qualify for a race on speed, was out of provisional spots and therefore DNQ. Andy Hillenburg and Morgan Shepherd moved up to fill in Shelmerdine's spot and Bodine made the field for his fourth start of the season.
 | ADVANCE AUTO PARTS 500 | | | | | |  | Jeff Gordon leads the way at Martinsville
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|  | Dale Earnhardt Jr. will start inside the top five
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Dale Earnhardt Jr. is trying to continue a streak of four consecutive top-five finishes at Martinsville on Sunday, and he proved he's on the right foot when he led Saturday's 45-minute Happy Hour practice.
"The Budweiser Chevrolet is a good race car," said Earnhardt, who will start fourth Sunday. "It turns well and is consistent lap after lap.
"The new tire threw us for a little loop in the beginning but we found what we needed today for the race tomorrow. We should be good tomorrow."
Six drivers posted practice speeds that were in the top-10 in both 45-minute Nextel Cup practice sessions Saturday, including Bud Pole sitter Jeff Gordon (7th, 4th), Kevin Harvick (2nd, 6th), Terry Labonte (3rd, 7th), Ricky Craven (4th, 10th), Jimmie Johnson (9th, 2nd) and Robby Gordon (10th, 8th).
"I think we are really strong," Johnson said after Happy Hour. "This is the best practice session we've had. Usually at this point we're pretty frustrated and still seem to come back and have a strong finish in the race (so) I'm very optimistic for tomorrow."
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Harvick said his Richard Childress Racing team had concentrated solely on race runs since it arrived and it appeared to be paying off.
"I have been happy with our GM Goodwrench Monte Carlo since we got here," Harvick said. "We qualified yesterday in race trim and had a good run (so) we are looking forward to a good race tomorrow."
"The Kellogg's Chevrolet is turning a lot better than it did yesterday," Labonte said. "We have run this car three times and it has never qualified very well but it has top-10 finishes in all three races so we should be OK tomorrow."
Drivers are usually the ones seen beating their shoe leather around the garage area while rideless, but Saturday at Martinsville a couple of out-of-work crew chiefs were making the rounds making contacts.
Paul Andrews, who won a NASCAR championship with the late Alan Kulwicki and most recently worked with Burton at Roush Racing until he was released, and former NASCAR tech center official Joe Garone, who formerly worked as a crew chief with a number of drivers, including Bill Elliott were both on site.
Garone said he planned to attend a test next week with PPI Motorsports at Kentucky Speedway to work with driver Ricky Craven on a two-car test.
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