MILLER LITE TEAM PENSKE DRIVER RUSTY WALLACE:
NASCAR'S "CAPTAIN CATCH-UP" ENTERING DARLINGTON

DARLINGTON, S.C. (March 13, 2002) ? Call him "Captain Catch-up." Or what about the leading "Make-up artist" for 2002? This year's "Comeback King" so far?

Regardless of the moniker, the fact is that Miller Lite Team Penske driver Rusty Wallace has the dubious distinction of making up the most spots from start to finish in the four NASCAR Winston Cup races completed to date.

In the four races leading up to this weekend's Carolina Dodge Dealers 400 at Darlington, S.C., Wallace has made up a total of 78 positions. It has been Wallace's and his Bill Wilburn-led team's uncanny ability to overcome having to start deep in the field that sees the Penske South Team eighth in the point standings entering the fifth race of the year.

"I'm proud of the team and the ability to bounce back like that, but the truth is that I'm totally embarrassed about the situation," said Wallace when shown the season's statistics entering Darlington. "The bottom line is that we've been getting ourselves deep in a hole in Friday's qualifying and then have to play catch-up all day long in Sunday's race.

"The perfect example is last weekend's Atlanta race. I bobbled it on my qualifying lap. I got sideways and that really cost me big time. It's so tight now that a tenth of a second can mean 15 spots. Two tenths and you can be back there at the rear like we've been. That's what happened. After winning nine poles two seasons ago and now having to take a provisional, it hurts and it's really embarrassing.

"Anyhow, we got into the race and on our first long green-flag run, we're running lap times faster than the leaders. Billy's (Wilburn, crew chief) calling out the lap times.mine versus the leader.and we're running a tenth faster or at least equal. But the fact is that we've dug ourselves such a hole as far as track position goes, that we're having to play catch-up the rest of the race.

"The big thing is that the guys haven't given up. We continue to have great pit stops and Billy's been really good at keeping me patient and keeping me pumped up during the race. He's on the radio a lot and he's shown that he's not afraid to make the calls like taking on only two tires and all. I'm just gonna' have to get the Friday deal turned around for us because we certainly can't complain about the car's performance so far on race day."

For the record, Wallace finds himself with a 30.25 average start and a 10.75 average finish entering Darlington. While his average start is certainly the worst of the current top eight in points, his average finish ranks fifth overall. As for the seven competitors who currently lead Wallace in points, their start-to-finish (plus or minus positions from start of race to the finish) totals for the first four races look
like this: 1) Sterling Marlin (+35); 2) Ryan Newman (+15); 3) Ward Burton (+55); 4) Mark Martin (+63); 5) Tony Stewart (-4); 6) Matt Kenseth (+53); and 7) Kurt Busch (-4).

While Wallace is quick to take the blame for his team's poor overall qualifying effort thus far this season, Wilburn prefers to keep focusing on the "big picture."

"What's most important is the big picture and the bottom line is that it's not where you start, but where you finish," said Wilburn, who admits that he is becoming more comfortable in the role as Wallace's crew chief after just four races. "What I'm really focusing on is our team improving from week to week at each of these tracks. When you look at our finishes this season versus last, we've had stronger finishes everywhere we've been except for Daytona. We were in line for a top-five finish there before we got caught up in the chain-reaction crash late in the race.

"We'll get better in qualifying, I'm confident of that. We'll get the
total package going and when we do, we'll win our share of races. Just stay tuned and keep your eyes on us."

As for dubious distinctions, Wallace also has another entering this weekend's race. In 36 career Darlington starts entering this weekend, he has yet to pay a visit to victory lane. He has 11 top-five finishes and 19 top-10 finishes to his credit. Runner-up finishes in the September races of 1987 and 1988 rate as his best overall finishes to date. His best career score in the Darlington spring race was a third-place finish in 1998. He started ninth and finished 10th in last spring's event and started fourth and finished 22nd here last fall.

Friday's 2:05 p.m. single round of qualifying will establish the
complete starting field for Sunday's 400-mile, 293-lap race. Sunday's Carolina Dodge Dealers 400 on the 1.366-mile egg-shaped Darlington Raceway begins at 1:00 p.m. EST and features live coverage by Fox-TV and
MRN Radio.