Jeff Gordon was glad to get out of Talladega with his sixth win of the season, while Dale Earnhardt was glad to get out alive by Bruce Newman The Talladega jinx reared its ugly head and claimed more than half the field—including Dale Earnhardt—in a series of brutal crashes. (Margin of victory: .146 of a second) Jeff Gordon, Chevrolet, 129 laps at 133.387 mph Dale Jarrett, Ford, 129 laps Mark Martin, Ford, 129 laps Ernie Irvan, Ford, 129 laps Jimmy Spencer, Ford, 129 laps 2 hours, 34 minutes, 21 seconds; 5 flags, 35 laps run under caution Jeremy Mayfield 192.370 mph with point totals (and points earned this weekend) 1 Jeff Gordon 2,631 (180) 2 Terry Labonte 2,622 (91) 3 Dale Earnhardt 2,608 (89) 4 Dale Jarrett 2,549 (175) 5 Sterling Marlin 2,285 (81) Winston Cup stock car racing is a kind of controlled mayhem, and its success relies on the drivers' maintaining a respectful distance from each other's sheet metal—usually two or three inches. But occasionally things get out of hand. And nowhere do they get out of hand more often than at Alabama's Talladega Superspeedway, where two colossal crashes during the DieHard 500 eliminated more than half the 42-car field before Jeff Gordon could seize control and his sixth victory of the season. One of the pileups involved Dale Earnhardt, who was leading the race at the time. He suffered a fractured clavicle and sternum after his car slammed into the outside wall nearly head-on and flipped onto its side before being T-boned by two other cars. "I held onto the steering wheel practically the whole time," Earnhardt said after the incident. "I was bouncing around in the car, but I was still braced in there pretty good." NASCAR officials stopped the race to cut Earnhardt out of his car and clean up debris. Ever since Bobby Allison nearly flew into Talladega's grandstands in 1987, NASCAR has kept speeds below 200 mph at Talladega and its superspeedway counterpart, Daytona, by mandating that restrictor plates be placed on engine carburetors. But the slower speeds have bunched up the fields, resulting in a series of spectacular crashes. "I guess that's what we've come to expect here," said veteran driver Geoff Bodine. "I think it's the most awful, dirtiest, nastiest, most dangerous racing in the whole wide world." The 3 car's number was up after Earnhardt's crash. photograph by Ernie Masche/CIA Because of the delays caused by the crashes and a rainstorm, darkness started to descend on the track before the race was even close to being finished. So NASCAR ordered a five-lap shoot-out to end the race. Gordon's Chevrolet led half a dozen Fords at the restart, then he lost the lead to Dale Jarrett on the first lap. Two laps later Gordon slipped past Jarrett and took the points lead for the first time this season.