Charlotte race in Oct. 1989 left indelible mark

It's not often that Charlotte Motor Speedway plays a pivotal role in anyone's championship aspirations. But after blowing an engine in the 1989 Coca-Cola 600, Rusty Wallace felt the track owed him something when the Cup Series returned in October.

Little did he know how much fate would smile kindly on him that day.

Wallace had come close to winning the 1988 championship, losing it to Bill Elliott by 24 points. And after a sluggish start to the 1989 season, three victories in the span of five races had allowed him to close to within 75 points of leader Dale Earnhardt heading into the All Pro Auto Parts 500.

Wallace's Pontiac qualified sixth-quickest while Earnhardt lined up 12th in his Chevrolet. But things immediately went badly for the black No. 3. Thirteen laps into the race, Earnhardt's car coasted into the garage area with a broken camshaft. And he was forced to watch helplessly as his lead disappeared.

"You can't drive the car if it ain't running, and it wasn't running," Earnhardt said. "Anybody can have trouble and we had it today."

On the other hand, Wallace couldn't believe his good fortune.

"I knew we'd be able to get past him if we could only finish the race," Wallace said. "We would like to have won it, but it just wasn't in the cards."

Instead, Mark Martin appeared to be headed for what would have been the first victory of his Cup career. His Ford dominated most of the second half of the race and he had a 10-second lead over Ken Schrader when he stopped for service on Lap 295.

However, Martin quickly realized something was wrong with the final set of tires -- afterward he learned one had equalized -- and he was unable to hold off Schrader, who fought handling issues early on to record his second career victory.

"We fell behind some early in the race when we had a long pit stop to make a pretty drastic chassis change," Schrader said. "But we didn't lose that much ground at the time and, after that, it was a turn here, a turn there all day long. The car really was good at the end."

Wallace eventually finished eighth and grabbed first place in the standings by 35 points over Earnhardt. But he wanted to make it clear that bad luck worked both ways.

"It's not like I fell into something," Wallace said. "If everybody remembers, at the beginning of the season I had three 31st-place finishes. I blew up at Martinsville, at Atlanta and blew up here at Charlotte. Dale doesn't have three finishes like that.

"I'm sorry Dale had a problem, but just about the time Dale has some bad fortune, I have some good fortune. I just hope that I can race him to the end and that we don't trip. I just want to run consistent, run up front and stay up front."

Earnhardt was dejected but philosophical.

"Rusty didn't beat us, we beat ourselves," Earnhardt said. "But we won't give up on winning the championship. It's definitely not over. This was the wrong time for this to happen, but there's still four races left and anything can happen."

Unfortunately for Earnhardt, he never could recover from the points hit he took that day. Wallace was able to build enough of a cushion to hold off the eventual seven-time champion by just 12 points.

That weekend also took a toll on a pair of racing legends. A.J. Foyt was knocked unconscious and sustained bruises to his neck and chest when he crashed in practice. The hit was reportedly hard enough to create a 5-inch split in his helmet.

And David Pearson's comeback attempt in the No. 21 Wood Brothers Ford ended prematurely when he determined his neck and back hurt too much after practice to last the 500 miles.

"I left the track with every intention of running the race," Pearson said. "The car ran great, and I really wanted to run. But my back and my neck hurt so much when I woke up the next morning that I knew I couldn't run a 500-mile race and do justice to myself and the Wood brothers.

"Knowing I couldn't run the car as good as it was, I realized that I can't run anytime. So I guess this is my official announcement of my retirement from driving."

He was replaced by Tommy Ellis, who finished 19th. Pearson was to have filled in for Neil Bonnett, who had broken his sternum at Dover.