Stewart Keeps On Truckin’ and Gets Win : Off-road racing: Thompson on his way to a sweep when his engine dies in main event.

Just when it appeared that Danny Thompson and his Chevrolet might sweep the card in the Grand National sport truck main event of the Mickey Thompson Off-Road Gran Prix, his engine suddenly stopped and allowed Ivan (Ironman) Stewart to win his third race of the stadium series season Saturday night in the Rose Bowl.

A crowd announced at 45,127 let out a gasp when Thompson, leading by about five car lengths with four laps remaining, pulled to the side of the dirt track and stopped. Thompson, who broke a four-year losing streak with a victory two weeks ago in Phoenix, had led from the start and was in control for the first eight laps.

The race was red-flagged to a stop a lap later when Don Esslinger flipped his Ford in the groove on the winding track laid out inside the football stadium. On the restart, Stewart and his Toyota held off Roger Mears and his son, Roger Jr., in Nissans, to take the checkered flag.

Walker Evans, last year’s Rose Bowl winner, finished fourth in a Jeep, followed by Jeff Huber, Stewart’s Toyota teammate.

Stewart, who won earlier in Anaheim and Seattle, strengthened his bid to regain the series championship he last won in 1984. He stretched his lead to 45 points after six of the 10 events. He has 360 to 315 for Thompson and 277 for Evans.

“You’ve got to have a little luck to win, and we had it tonight,” Stewart said. “The key to our success has been the reliability of the Toyota trucks. Very seldom have we failed to finish. They just keep on running.

“I was surprised that Danny got off the line ahead of me because my truck is usually strong on the start. He would have been tough to catch, but we were still in it when he stopped. It was a tough break for him after running as strong as he had all night.”

Thompson won both heats, the second one in a destruction derby that saw the race stopped twice for multi-truck wrecks. Walker Evans’ Jeep was so crippled after colliding with the charging Stewart that Evans, a veteran from Riverside, climbed out and walked to his pits.

Glenn Harris, Evans’ Jeep teammate, rolled over and was precariously upside down until course workers could roll the truck over. Once it was back on four wheels, Harris took off and finished sixth.

Each time, Thompson was chased across the finish line by a Mears, father Roger in the first heat and son Roger Jr. in the second.

“It was a real destruction derby out there,” the elder Mears said. “We were all so tightly bunched that it seemed like everyone was running into each other.”

Bob Gordon, 42-year-old veteran from Orange, held off defending Super 1600 series champion Mitch Mustard of Arvada, Colo., in the main event for 1600cc buggies. It was the second victory this year for Gordon, who also won at Seattle and it was his seventh career stadium win. In 1985 he shared the Super 1600 championship with Jerry Welchel, who finished fourth Saturday night.

The night’s most spectacular accident occurred during the Ultra-stock final. Vince Tjelmeland, in a yellow Nissan, appeared to have the race won with only two turns left when he tried to lap Jim Smith’s Cherokee wagon. Smith got sideways and rolled on his side and Tjelmeland, with no place to go, climbed up and stalled with his front wheels atop the wagon.

Larry Noel, the Ultrastock season leader, managed to slip past and cruised to the win.

Other winners were Donny Banks of Norco in the 4-wheel ATVs, Rennie Awana of Cerritos in Super Lites and Jeremy McGrath of Sun City on a Kawasaki in the 250cc Ultracross motorcycle race.