credited his Mall.com 400 taylor victory in March to the crew led by Tommy Baldwin. "All I had to do was make it 400 miles," Ward said As far as the NASCAR Busch custom made golf club series grand national division is concerned, darlington raceway could be renamed mark martin raceway. if there is a nascar busch series record at darlington, golf chances are that martin has it. the veteran pilot, taylor statistically the finest competitor in series history, holds the record for most victories, seven, and bud poles, six. this weekend, martin will make his final series start in the dura lube 200 (saturday, 3:30 p.m. et on espn tv and prn radio) at darlington, a track he has learned to tame in the no. 60 winn-dixie ford. martin''s most recent addition to the darlington record book came in march when he won from the bud pole for the second time in his career. after spending much of the race battling jeff burton and matt kenseth for the lead, martin took the lead for good with 24 laps to go. kenseth went high to challenge for the lead with two laps remaining, but could not pass martin. burton and martin were side-by-side on the final lap of the race, but martin pulled ahead just enough to claim the third of his four series wins this season.

had those ambitions come to fruition, mcclure feels the state of his race team may be a bit different. "i may have had the problems, but i think i could have got things going in the right direction a lot quicker (with a second team) because made with more testing and input from two different drivers and race golf teams, i think we could have got through this a lot quicker," mcclure said. hamilton currently ranks 30th in the standings. he''s never finished worse that 23rd in any full season in his career. it''s time to turn things around, and the change is on, starting this weekend at darlington raceway, where hamilton taylor has three consecutive seventh-place finishes. "everybody loves darlington. i think it''s one of our favorite race tracks," mcclure said. "we were lucky enough to win a race there with sterling, i think back in ''95. we''re looking forward to it, and i think we''re going to be ready for it." hamilton added, "just staying off the fence (is the key to success at darlington), and that''s hard to do there. several guys have won that race and have had the recognized darlington stripe. it depends on who hits it the lightest. "every lap made you go around there there''s one groove that works and then two laps later that groove doesn''t work any more. we''ve been pretty fortunate the last three or four races. we''ve been able to run there and not get in any crashes and not even get a stripe on the car. all that means golf is we''re way overdue for it." after the struggles they''ve faced the past few seasons, hamilton and the morgan-mcclure contingent are well overdue.

"i really love racing at places that are wide where you taylor can pass easily and darlington just isn''t one of those places. it is so tight that passing is tough to do. in fact, the place is so narrow, you''ll be successful if you just don''t hit the wall all day long." heading into the weekend, green''s lead over second-place jason keller is an astounding 589 points. the race for second-place made has become heated between four drivers -- keller, todd bodine and golf rookies kevin harvick and ron taylor hornaday. keller is enjoying the most consistent season of his career in the no. 57 excedrin chevrolet. harvick and hornaday have each won twice in nascar 2000 -- they have combined to win four of the past seven events -- and will likely be tough yet again made this weekend. harvick dominated last friday night''s food city 250 at bristol motor speedway, leading more laps than anyone in series history -- 241 of 250 -- en route to victory lane. he trails keller by just seven points with eight races remaining. harvick''s key to victory lane this weekend? golf bud pole qualifying. "darlington''s narrow just like bristol and it takes a long time to get by somebody without flat running into them,"

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