NASCAR WCUP: Wood Brothers Back To Work At Martinsville Speedway After Bristol Win
Posted By Terry Callahan
Motorsports Editor, The Auto Channel
March 27, 2001MARTINSVILLE, VA – It was barely 8 o’clock, so early on Monday morning that the sun hadn’t begun to knock the chill off the early morning air in the Martinsville Speedway garage area.
It was so chilly, that every time Eddie Wood laughed, a wispy puff of condensation rolled out of his mouth. And this morning, Eddie Wood was doing a lot of laughing.
Not more than 15 hours earlier, with Elliott Sadler behind the wheel of their Motorcraft Ford, the Wood Brothers had snapped a seven-year winless streak and broken out of a nosedive that had taken this venerable Winston Cup team about as low as it had ever been.
The 25-year-old Sadler took the lead with about 70 laps to go in the Food City 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway and never faltered on the way to his first Winston Cup victory.
“I think it’s the biggest thing that’s happen to our race team, ever,” Wood said early Monday morning as his team geared up for a two-day testing session at Martinsville Speedway in preparation for the April 8 Virginia 500. “I mean we’ve had big moments and milestones, but this win, I think, got us back to where we belong now.
“We’ve been struggling so long and trying to get back to where you were competitive every week and actually get to the point where you could finish in the top 10 or top five, much less winning a race. This means everything to us because so many people had gambled on us. Ford Motor Company, Motorcraft, the Air Force, they gambled on getting on our car. It just feels really good to pay them back for taking that gamble.”
In the time since Sadler took the checkered flag at Bristol, Wood said he’s been slapped on the back so many times, he’s sore. There have been more interviews than the co-owner of the Wood Brothers Racing team can count. But before all the celebrating, as the final laps wore down late Sunday afternoon, it was eerily quiet on the team’s two-way radios.
“It was just very quiet,” Wood said of the last laps. “We let the spotter do the talking. We wanted Elliott to concentrate because he had the heat on him. Pat (crew chief Pat Tryson) just told him it’s 30 to go, 20 to go, counted it down to 10. He didn’t say a lot.”
While there was still plenty of back-slapping and smiling going on amongst team members as the sun slid up over the grandstands at Martinsville Speedway this morning, it was quickly back to work for the Wood Brothers. After a visit to Texas Motor Speedway this weekend, it will be back to the .526-mile track that’s only about 30 minutes East of the Wood Brothers Stuart shop.
“It’s no secret to the whole world this is our toughest, our toughest endeavor is racing here,” Wood said from inside Martinsville Speedway’s new garage. “It’s our home track and for some reason we’ve always struggled here, even back 10, 20 years. It always seems it doesn’t matter what kind of car we bring over here, who works on it, what kind of motor, who drives it, if it’s got 21 on the side of it, we’re just gonna have a hard time.
Hopefully we can turn that around.
“We’ve got a lot of new things that Pat has brought us. In fact some of the things we did at Bristol this weekend should apply here. We’ve got two new Roush cars here and hopefully we can work some of that stuff out, because Elliott’s run well here in Late Models. It’s kinda up to us to get it going, because he’s proved he can get it done over here.”
The Virginia 500/Advance Auto Parts 250 weekend kicks off with Bud Pole qualifying for the Craftsman Truck Series at 1:30 p.m. on Friday, April 6 followed by time trials for the Winston Cup Series at 3 p.m. Tickets for qualifying are $15 for adults and children under 12 get in free.
Tickets for the Advance Auto Parts 250 Craftsman Truck race are $30 for adults and $5 for children ages 6-12. All seats are unreserved. There still are great seats available for the Virginia 500 NASCAR Winston Cup race for $40-$70 each. To purchase tickets call the speedway ticket office toll free at 877-722-3849 or go online at www.martinsvillespeedway.com.
Text provided by Mike Smith
Editors Note: To view hundreds of hot racing photos and art, visit
The Racing Photo Museum and the
Visions of Speed Art Gallery.