Gordon Wins ‘499 1/2’ at Soggy Charlotte

Rain turned NASCAR’s longest race into two short ones.

Bobby Labonte won the first half, but Jeff Gordon won the one that counted, the Coca-Cola 600, on Sunday night by pulling away in the closing stage of a race that was held up because of a lengthy rain delay just before the midway point.

The event was scheduled for 400 laps on Charlotte Motor Speedway’s 1 1/2-mile trioval but was called after 333, or 499 1/2 miles.

Gordon’s series-leading fifth victory of 1997 came after he overcame an early pit-stop miscue that dropped him to 38th in the 42-car field.

He wound up about eight car-lengths ahead of Rusty Wallace.

The 37th running of NASCAR’s longest race started nearly half an hour late because of rain, and it was halted for more than 2 1/2 hours on Lap 195 because of another thunderstorm.

Robby Gordon, who had started his day at Indianapolis, and who returned there today for the Indy 500, blamed himself.

“The rain has stuck with me. It won’t go away,” he said.

Gordon ran strong early at Charlotte, moving up 12 spots from his 28th starting position after the first 25 laps. He was 13th near the midway point before losing control of his Chevrolet and slamming into the fourth turn wall, damaging the left front and rear.

He did not come back to the race after the final rain delay.

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Michael Schumacher had an absolutely brutal weekend in Barcelona that was capped with his not only losing the Spanish Grand Prix, but also his Formula One points lead.

Starting in the fourth row on the grid after blowing an engine during qualifying the day before, Schumacher nursed his Ferrari to second place early in the race, but then served only as a blocker for the rest of the field while Jacques Villeneuve and his Williams-Renault ran off and hid.

Villeneuve relinquished the lead only while he was in the pits briefly and won for the third time this season, finishing the 64 laps over the 2.937-mile Catalunya Circuit in 1 hour 30 minutes 35.896 seconds and averaging 124.3 mph.

Villaneuve leads the drivers’ standings with 30 points, three ahead of Schumacher.

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Damon Bradshaw, riding a Manchester Honda, overcame terrible conditions to win his 30th American Motorcycle Assn. National Motocross event, but his first in four years--the High Point Nationals at Mount Morris, Pa.

Bradshaw, who won the second of the two races, edged out Ryan Hughes, who won the first race. John Dowd was third.