Benson Smokes Labonte at Berlin

First, Johnny Benson Jr. invites his friends up from North Carolina to race with him at his home track.  Then he proceeds to whip the lugnuts out of them.  That has become a habit for Benson, and Bobby Labonte was his latest victim.

Benson outran the field in Wednesday night's The Chet Late Model Invitational, a 125-lap feature race at the Berlin Raceway in Marne. Benson held off the T.A. Gentry cars of Joe Bush and Lee Anderson, just as he did in June when his NASCAR buddy, Michael Waltrip, made the trek up to Marne.

Labonte finished 14th after qualifying 26th in the No. 1 Late Model he borrowed from former track champion Randy Sweet of Kalamazoo. It was Labonte's first Berlin appearance, and he was never in the hunt for the $5,000 first-place cash prize.

The same can't be said for Benson, who started second and ran in the top-five throughout the race. Still, it was Tim DeVos' misfortune that opened the door to Benson's victory.

DeVos, the defending track champion, was out in front with nine laps to go when he was pinched into the frontstretch wall by lapped traffic. That gave the lead to Benson on the restart, and he rode off to a nearly one-second win over Bush, the division's point leader.

"Tim would have beaten us," Benson said. "We happened to be in the right place at the right time. We had a good car, I'm not saying we had a bad car, it's just that Tim had a great car."

Labonte arrived on the Berlin Fairgrounds around 1:30 p.m. Wednesday, and fans were already waiting to meet the 2000 NASCAR Winston Cup champion. Labonte, who is ninth in Nextel Cup points, signed autographs and posed for pictures throughout the afternoon and early evening while acclimating himself to the car and race track. He said he hadn't raced a Late Model since 1989.

Wednesday's program drew 6,277 spectators, and he signed the usual items, from caps, T-shirts, diecast cars and photos. He headed to his souvenir hauler outside the track after the race and continued to sign.

But ask Labonte to identify the strangest thing a fan has ever wanted him to sign, and he won't say.

"I can't repeat it," Labonte said, while taking a break before Wednesday afternoon's practice session. "But I can tell you the second strangest thing.

"One time a fan wanted me to sign a prosthetic arm -- off her body. She took her arm right off, gave it to me and asked me to sign it."

Labonte's race was nearly cut short when he was tapped from behind on lap 97. Labonte bobbled, drifted up and pushed Billy Shannon of Kalamazoo around and hard into the frontstretch wall. Shannon was transported to the hospital to treat his injured arm, while Labonte was able to continue.

Whitecaps Racing Development, Inc., has made a commitment to lure stock car racing's biggest stars to the track since purchasing the operating lease in the fall of 2000. The fact that Berlin is Benson's home track and that he is an equity owner has helped made that effort smoother. Labonte penciled in this week since Nextel Cup is racing Sunday at Michigan International Speedway.

"Johnny asked me, and I like Johnny a lot, he's probably one of my better friends at the race track," Labonte said. "It looked like a fun night during the week, and I'm already in Michigan, so I told him to let's make it all happen."

All three of Berlin's class ran Wednesday. Defending Sportsman champion Lee VanDyk won his second straight and third feature overall when he beat out Dave Hull and Dave Lake in the 30-lap main event. Brian Wiersma continued his charge to the Super Stock title, winning his fifth main of the season over runner-up Nick Shotko and John Smith Sr.