Chasing the Dream; NASCAR is suffering from some small fields.

Byline: AL PEARCE

NASCAR had seen enough. One half-speed lap without a crew or pit tools convinced officials Joe Ruttman wasn't all that serious about the Subway 400 at Rockingham.

So they parked him after one mile of "competition" at the North Carolina Speedway. His last-place payoff was $54,196-for one mile. By contrast, third-place Jamie McMurray ran 400 miles, used about 15 sets of tires and earned $96,425.

"That was sort of a sham, and we don't condone it," NASCAR spokesman Jim Hunter said of the incident. "That shouldn't be the way drivers go about racing with us. But that team presented a car for tech inspection. The car passed and the driver qualified for the race. It wasn't a good situation, but it's our system and we had to let him start. But we didn't have to leave him out there any longer than one lap."

That charade quickly turned Ruttman, a 60-year-old grandfather of six, into the poster child for Nextel Cup field fillers. He is among a half-dozen underfunded drivers who scan entry lists, then enter races that are expected to have weak fields. Their teams cut corners, buying only the tires they absolutely need and running a few laps before being sidelined by something, real or imagined. Occasionally, NASCAR will park them for simply being unable to maintain a safe and reasonable pace.

Say what you will, but NASCAR needs field fillers. After all, it has only 36 well-funded, full-time teams prepared to run every race. How did this happen? Because Junie Donlavey, Travis Carter, Dave Marcis, Bill Baumgardner, A.J. Foyt and Jim Smith have all but closed their doors. Dale Earnhardt Inc. has gone from three full-time teams to two, and Bill Davis Racing from two to one. The Morgan-McClure team has lost its backing.

Meanwhile, Kirk Shelmer-dine has become the most successful-if there is such a thing-of the current field fillers. He has run six of seven races (starting near the rear and finishing between 39th and 43rd), completed 142 of 2312 laps, and earned almost $380,000 with relatively low overhead. He has had "handling problems" three times, was too slow twice and has blown one engine.