Park holds out for timely Rockingham triumph.

Steve Park raced to victory in round two of the 2001 NASCAR Winston Cup, beating reigning Champion Bobby Labonte by half a car length to take his second career victory.

Despite the fact that the Dura Lube 400 started on Sunday and finished on Monday, a good sized crowd turned out to see the final 342 laps of the rain-delayed race and they all went home happy after Dale Earnhardt Inc. driver Steve Park held off a determined charge from Bobby Labonte to take a hugely popular victory.

After NASCAR's darkest week, Park's win lifted the spirits of the entire pitlane as you knew that somewhere overhead, Dale Earnhardt was smiling as he watched Park display a tonne of guts and pure grit as he struggled against worn tyres and an empty fuel tank as Labonte closed in during the final laps.

Park had taken the green flag on lap 52 in third spot behind overnight leader Stacy Compton and Jeff Gordon although Compton soon had to pit leaving Gordon and Park to battle it out for the lead and although the No.1 Pennzoil Chevrolet driver edged ahead at the 75 lap mark, Gordon's superior pit work during the first round of stops saw him re-claim the place.

The top two were joined at the front by Daytona winner Michael Waltrip and Labonte as the race moved into the middle stages and although Gordon maintained a marginal advantage over his pursuers both Park and Waltrip were almost being carried around the 1.017-mile oval by the fans, who were desperate to see a DEI car claim victory.

Although the racing was close and entertaining with Ricky Craven's charge from 41st to seventh by lap 200 and Ward Burton's performance as he fought to regain the time he lost when a wheel nut came loose on Sunday being the highlights, there was an air of conservation around the track and the first yellow of the day did not appear until lap 243 when Mike Skinner performed a harmless spin in turn two.

Once again Gordon, Park and Labonte had the strongest cars when the race re-started and the leading trio began to pull clear of fourth placed man Johnny Benson and fifth placed Tony Stewart with Park finally finding a way passed the No.24 DuPont Chevrolet on lap 262 and quickly opening up a three second advantage over Gordon.

The final scheduled stops came on lap 300 when the caution was thrown for Compton's blown engine and the No.92 Kodiak Dodge became the first Intrepid to retire from a Winston Cup race with a mechanical problem. On this occasion Park was able to beat Gordon out of the pits only to see the three-time Champion get the drop on him at the green flag and move back into the lead.

For the next 40 laps the top two remained glued together with Labonte keeping a watching brief in third, saving his tyres on such an abrasive track and watching his fuel mileage as some teams began to express concerns that they would struggle to make the end of the race without a splash and dash.

After nearly 40 laps of following Gordon, Park brought the crowd to its feet on lap 339 when he managed to muscle his way underneath the leader going into Turn Three and kept the line to take a lead he would never loose.

Park quickly sought to establish his position, opening up a 1.5-second lead over Gordon during the next 30 laps as lapped traffic became a constant factor while Labonte, more than five seconds down at one point, slowly began eating into the leaders' advantage as his car's set-up came into its own.

Gordon was dispatched in a fine three wide manoeuvre on lap 375 with Labonte going low into Turn Three as he and Gordon lapped fellow Hendrick Motorsports driver Jerry Nadeau and by the time the race went into the final ten laps, the No.18 Joe Gibbs owned Pontiac was closing inexorably of Park, clearly struggling with worn tyres.

The gap came down lap by lap, car length by car length as the fans continued to cheer Park on although when the white flag came out there were plenty of nervous faces as Labonte nosed his way underneath Park going into Turn One. Park defended, forcing his adversary to take the high line going down the backstretch where he was once again blocked as the crowd reached boiling point.

But Park's task was not yet over as Labonte attacked once again, low in Turn Three and the crowd gasped as the green machine drew alongside the yellow and black machine as they rounded the final turn. Somehow Park managed to stay ahead though, using the high line to his advantage to cross the line less than a cars length ahead of Labonte before running out of fuel as he performed a touching Polish victory lap in honour of his late team-boss.

Park and his crew were understandably emotional in victory lane after experiencing one of the toughest weeks anyone in the history of NASCAR has had to endure while Labonte too had special thoughts of the man he beat into second place this time last year but who was only at Rockingham in spirit this time around.

Gordon fell back by some five seconds at the chequered flag but still had the consolation of leading a race high 180 laps against Park's 167 while Tony Stewart in the second Joe Gibbs entry headed home a frantic scrap for fourth, beating off Craven, Benson and Rusty Wallace. Craven recorded Cal Wells' first top five finish as a NASCAR team-boss after a truly epic drive from 41st on the grid while Benson impressed everyone with a mature drive in the MBV Motorsports Pontiac and was unlucky to miss out on a place inside the top five after holding down fourth for much of the race.

In fact the best racing of the day came during the battle for 4th-7th and the titanic struggle for eighth spot which involved Wallace, Craven, Dale Jarrett, Sterling Marlin, Dave Blaney, Elliott Sadler, Robert Pressley and Ward Burton during the second half of the race.

Finally clinching the spot after a truly dreadful week was Marlin, who finished as the best placed Dodge and moved into second in points behind early leader Wallace. Completing the top ten were the impressive Dave Blaney and last year's winner Jarrett, who just couldn't find the right set-up to challenge for the lead despite looking poised to attack from sixth place with 50 laps remaining.

Of the others, both Burton and Pressley scraped the wall as their tyres disintegrated but theirs, along with that of Jeff Burton's early on in the race, remained isolated incidents and tyre wear was not a big an issue as was initially thought.

Pressley eventually finished a deserved twelfth behind Sadler while Burton found that his brush with the concrete compromised his set-up and he dropped to 16th, one lap down on the winner.

Thirteen cars finished on the lead lap with the last of them being Bobby Hamilton who completed a quiet yet rapid day for Andy Petree Racing. Perhaps the biggest applause should be reserved for 14th place finisher Kevin Harvick, who only fell off the lead lap during the last 30 miles and who has handled the pressure of effectively stepping into Dale Earnhardt's shoes with maturity far beyond his years.

Mark Martin finished 19th after losing two laps with a bad vibration although he fought back strongly towards the end while Daytona winner Waltrip fell back to 20th. Jeff Burton made several visits to the pits to try and cure his wall-banging related problems en-route to 37th while the luckless Jeremy Mayfield looked set for a top ten finish until his rear axle broke dropping him to 38th. Ricky Rudd was a strong top five contender until his transmission failed on lap 255 leaving him with no gears and a 39th place finish while Dale Earnhardt Jr was classified last of all after retiring the No.8 Budweiser Chevrolet on the first lap of yesterday's race.

So, one race on and NASCAR has started to move on and while Earnhardt's presence was visibly missed at Rockingham, all drivers donned a No.3 baseball cap for the duration of the weekend, the drivers did a superb job of lifting the spirit and sharing their thoughts and prayers with the fans and the media. The racing was clean and safe and the finish was the type that made NASCAR famous and the winner, you couldn't have picked a better one.