Dale Earnhardt will have his hands full Sunday. But then so will Bill Elliott.
Earnhardt, 1980 Winston Cup champion, won the second of Thursday`s two qualifying races that set the field for the Sunday`s Daytona 500, averaging 153.636 miles an hour. Elliott averaged 153.270 to win the day`s first 125-miler.
Earnhardt conceded he would have to run the ”ragged edge” to beat Elliott Sunday. ”It`s sort of like messing with an angry lion,” Earnhardt explained. ”You mess with him too much, he`s going to bite you.”
Elliott saw the showdown differently.
”It looks like Earnhardt is going to be the guy to beat,” Elliott said. ”He really looks stable. He went from seventh to first in two laps.”
In Thursday`s tuneups, Elliott demonstrated the meaning of the stock-car expression ”sandbagging” to perfection.
Like a poker player who refuses to show his hand until the pot is bulging and then runs away with the money, Elliott laid off the pace throughout the first of the two 125-mile qualifying races.
Elliott, who started on the pole, dropped back after the first lap, almost as if by design. At the 35th lap, he was in fourth place. He moved up to third on Lap 39 and to second on the 43d.
Finally, on the 50th and final lap, he zipped past leader Bobby Allison deep in the backstretch and rolled to victory.
The first and final laps were the only ones Elliott led all day, but they were enough to put the 30-year-old Georgian in line for his second straight Daytona triple.
Elliott won Daytona`s hat trick last year, capturing the pole and the first twin 125 in record time and then taking his first Daytona 500 checkered flag. Only two other drivers, Fireball Roberts in 1962 and Cale Yarborough in 1984, have won the Daytona triple.
The two 125-mile qualifying races established the third through 30th positions for Sunday`s 500-mile race.
Elliott, mustering as straight a face as he could, insisted he wasn`t playing games with Allison in hanging off the pace while Allison led the pack in the first race from Laps 27 through 49.
”Sandbagging? I was running as fast as I could stand it,” Elliott drawled.
He received an unintentional assist from Davey Allison, Bobby`s 23-year-old son and a candidate for rookie of the year this season.
With the senior Allison leading Elliott on the backstretch of the final lap, Davey politely pulled to his right to give the two leaders racing room. Elliott swung low on the track and darted into the void to roar past Bobby and win by two lengths.
Elliott`s victory was another trophy for his Ford Thunderbird, in which he dominated the Winston Cup circuit last year with 11 titles. But General Motors appears to be closing the gap. Earnhardt and Bodine drive Chevrolets and Bobby Allison a Buick.
Earnhardt wrested the lead from Bodine on the 38th lap and held it until he took the checkered flag.
