Earnhardt Keeps Unser Behind in Race of Champions Victory

Four NASCAR drivers took turns drafting one another into and out of the lead in the opening race of International Race of Champions XVIII on Friday at Daytona International Speedway, but when pole-sitter Dale Earnhardt streaked toward the finish, it was Indy car veteran Al Unser Jr. he had to beat.

It was the 22nd victory for Earnhardt at Daytona, although he has never won the Daytona 500, a lapse he will seek to remedy Sunday.

Earnhardt, Rusty Wallace, Mark Martin and Dale Jarrett all led during the 40-lap race for 12 of the country’s leading drivers in identically prepared Dodge Avengers. Unser was the only non-Winston Cup driver to lead.

“My Dodge was the best Dodge on the last lap because it got real wide right then,” a smiling Earnhardt said. “I flat-out had to block Little Al. That rascal’s tough. He’d be a champion in NASCAR the way he is in Indy cars if he raced with us.”

World of Outlaw champion Steve Kinser, who races winged sprint cars and had never competed in the IROC, was a surprising seventh, second behind Unser among non-NASCAR drivers unfamiliar with high-banked superspeedway racing.