Cheever’s Fuel Runs Out, so Does Victory

As Eddie Cheever sat calmly, explaining how he ran out of fuel while leading Sunday’s Bosch Spark Plug Grand Prix with less than two laps remaining, there was someplace he would rather have been.

“I’m doing a very good job sitting here talking to you,” he told the assembled media. “I feel like going off into a room alone and smacking my head into a wall.”

Instead of Cheever giving A.J. Foyt his first victory as a team owner since the 1981 Pocono 500, Emerson Fittipaldi wound up on the victory podium as Cheever tried to squeeze the final 94 laps out of one tank of fuel and came up nearly two miles short on Nazareth Speedway’s one-mile oval in Nazareth, Pa.

As Cheever suddenly slowed, Fittipaldi drove past with Jacques Villeneuve in his slipstream.

Fittipaldi, the oldest driver on the circuit at 48, barely held off Villeneuve, the youngest at 23, by 0.309 seconds--about two car-lengths--to earn the 22nd Indy-car victory of his career and his third win at the track owned by Roger Penske, his car owner.

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Rusty Wallace held off Ted Musgrave as darkness fell to win the rain-plagued Hanes 500 at Martinsville (Va.) Speedway. Wallace finished three car lengths ahead of Musgrave. After the race ended, Musgrave was punched in the face by Billy Ingle, Ricky Rudd’s crew chief. Ingle apparently was upset that Musgrave had tapped Rudd to get by him with less than 50 laps left, sending Rudd into a spin. Musgrave wasn’t seriously injured. NASCAR officials said they were reviewing the matter.

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Daryl Beattie, riding a Suzuki, overtook 1994 world champion Michael Doohan on the final lap in heavy rain and won the 500cc division of the Japan Grand Prix in Suzuka, the third leg of the World Motorcycling Championships.

Ralf Waldmann of Germany won the 250cc race and Haruchika Aoki of Japan won the 125cc race.

Eliminations for the NHRA Fram Nationals will resume today in Commerce, Ga., after rain ended racing after the first round of Top Fuel.

Tennis

Martina Navratilova’s return to professional tennis was successful, albeit in a meaningless doubles match after the United States had already clinched a spot in the Fed Cup semifinals in Aventura, Fla. Navratilova teamed with Gigi Fernandez to defeat Austria’s Barbara Schett and Petra Schwarz-Ritter, 6-2, 6-1, to cap the second-seeded Americans’ 5-0 sweep of Austria. Mary Joe Fernandez took advantage of an early break in the third set to defeat Judith Wiesner, 6-3, 2-6, 6-3, clinching a semifinal berth for the United States against France. In the other Fed Cup World Group play Sunday, defending champion Spain defeated Bulgaria, 3-2, and Germany defeated Japan, 4-1, to advance to the semifinals.

Top-seeded Michael Chang defeated Sweden’s Jonas Bjorkman, 6-3, 6-1, and won the Hong Kong Salem Open for the second consecutive year.

Marc Rosset of Switzerland won the Nice Open in Nice, France with a 6-4, 6-0 victory over top-seeded Yevgeny Kafelnikov.

Miscellany

Free agent linebacker Kurt Gouveia, formerly of the Washington Redskins, signed with the Philadelphia Eagles. . . . Ted Silva pitched the first nine-inning no-hitter in Cal State Fullerton history in a 5-0 victory over Pacific in a Big West Conference baseball game at Fullerton. . . . Tiger Woods injured the rotator cuff of his right shoulder, forcing him to withdraw from the U.S. Intercollegiate Men’s Golf Tournament at Stanford. . . . Melisa Moses won her second consecutive national title in the women’s three-meter springboard, and David Pichler captured his second championship in three days in men’s platform at the National Diving Championships in Midland, Tex. . . . Anderson Lins de Medeiros, 16, was shot dead by rival soccer fans in Sao Paulo, Brazil, in an incident that police said was becoming routine in the city. . . . Holly McPeak and Nancy Reno defeated Gail Castro and Elaine Roque, 15-8, in the final of the Austin Open Women’s Professional Volleyball Association tournament at Lake Travis, Tex.