He Takes the Low Road and Wins : Auto racing: Gordon outsmarts Earnhardt and Irvan to take the lead with two laps remaining.

Jeff Gordon is only 22, but he spent a lot of years racing sprint cars and midgets on dirt tracks before making the move to Winston Cup stock cars and high-banked superspeedways two years ago.

Sunday, in the Busch Clash--a pair of 10-lap sprints for last year’s pole winners that are combined to determine a single winner--Gordon used all the experience of his youth to snooker a pair of racing’s toughest campaigners, Dale Earnhardt and Ernie Irvan, to win the $45,000 winners’ purse at Daytona International Speedway.

Gordon, running third with two laps remaining, went low through the second turn in a three-abreast move that shot him to the front. Once there, he held off Brett Bodine, who followed him past the leaders.

It was Gordon’s second win on Daytona’s high banks. Last year, he became the first rookie and the youngest driver to win one of the Twin 125-mile qualifying heats for the Daytona 500.

“To beat these guys, the best in the world, is just unbelievable,” said Gordon, who got in the race by winning the pole in last October’s Mello Yello 500 at Charlotte, N.C. “This is kind of like the racing I was used to doing growing up. In sprint car racing, you start in the back and come to the front as fast as you can in as few laps as possible.

“You see a hole and you go for it. It works or it doesn’t work. We may do this race tomorrow and I’d go to the inside and to the back I’d go.”

Irvan and Earnhardt had come from the rear of the 13-car field in three laps to set up what appeared to be a shootout between the two most aggressive drivers in racing. But while they were keeping a wary eye on one another, Gordon slipped in behind Earnhardt and waited for the moment to strike.

“Ernie was leading and Earnhardt was looking all over, trying to (find a way) by him,” Gordon explained. “I wouldn’t commit either way. When Earnhardt would go low, I would kind of go with him and then maybe I’d sneak up there with Ernie.

“When Earnhardt made his move and got underneath Ernie when we got down to turn one, I decided to go with him. When Dale’s car looked like it was getting loose and he had to lift a little bit, I pulled alongside. Luckily, Brett (Bodine) went with me. If no one had gone with me, I would have been out there all by myself. Brett and I had the momentum and got by on the inside.”

Earnhardt admitted he made a mistake.

“I should have been paying attention,” Earnhardt said. “I didn’t know what lap it was. I was just trying to get by Ernie. I really wasn’t focusing and we just got beat. The 24 car (Gordon) and the 26 (Bodine) hooked up and ran by us. I congratulate them.”

Earnhardt won the first 10-lap segment, collecting $25,000. The race was halted and the field inverted for the final 10 laps.

Loy Allen Jr., who will start on the pole in the Daytona 500, had an embarrassing moment in the ARCA 200 when the tie rod broke in his Ford, pitching him into the wall while following the pace car at a slow speed.

“I don’t know what happened,” Allen said. “I tried to accelerate to keep it from snapping to the right, but that only made it worse.”

Mike Wallace of St. Louis won the accident-marred race in a Chevrolet.