1993: Big E jumps restart, but holds of Martin at stripe

While Dale Earnhardt relished a sweet victory in the 1993 Winston, there were more than enough sour grapes to go around afterward.

The question that was on everyone's minds: Does NASCAR have different rules for different drivers, or was it just a matter of different rules for different races?

Earnhardt

Mark Martin had the fastest car all evening and appeared to be well on his way to victory in the 10-lap shootout portion when Terry Labonte blew an engine and hit the wall, bringing out the caution with two laps remaining.

That set up a double-file restart, with Martin on the inside and Earnhardt to his right. But as the field came down to the line, Earnhardt jumped ahead and beat the leader to the line. That forced NASCAR officials to throw the yellow for another restart.

"My spotter said the caution is out and ... I think you know why," Earnhardt said. "I didn't say nothing, I just grinned."

But instead of sending Earnhardt to the tail end of the longest line for jumping the restart, as is normally the case, officials restarted the race in the same order. This time, Earnhardt stayed side-by-side with Marlin, finally making the pass on the backstretch and hanging on by .16 seconds for the $222,500 payday. As he climbed out of his car, some boos were heard from fans obviously unhappy with the turn of events.

So did Earnhardt play fair? A few drivers weren't so sure.

"To jump the start and give [Earnhardt] another try at it is like giving a bank robber a second shot. It's like you didn't do it good enough the first time, try it again," said Ernie Irvan, who finished third and had a car capable of winning. "The Winston is great, but let's not let somebody blatantly take a gun and steal the money."

Davey Allison, the two-time defending champion, also wasn't comfortable with the ruling.

"It gets to me that somebody can get away with all this stuff and nothing ever gets said about it," Allison said. "If anybody else flinches, they get their hand slapped."

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Jack Roush, owner of Martin's car, said if it had been anybody but Earnhardt, NASCAR would have black-flagged him. But a disappointed Martin was more introspective about his near-miss.

"Dale just beat us," Martin said. "Winston puts up the money and they make the rules. It's not like the [Coca-Cola] 600. If it had been like that, I think we would have had the car to win. Dale just beat us, that's all."

Earnhardt admitted that he planned to try to steal the restart.

"As soon as the caution came out," he said. "... But I got too eager. That's like when you get a little and want a little more. I got greedy and wanted too much. I wanted the whole thing.

"I didn't think I'd get away with it. I thought I would try. ... Luckily, they didn't put me in the back of the field."

Irvan led from start to finish in the first 30-lap segment, with Martin second. Then the 20-car field was inverted.

Rick Mast, who made the field by finishing fifth in the Winston Open earlier in the day, held off Earnhardt over the next 30 laps, giving him the No. 1 starting spot in the shootout. But both Earnhardt and Martin made quick work of Mast, making a three-wide pass of the leader coming out of Turn 2. Mast wound up 11th.

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