Hard feelings, hard driving are what NASCAR is all about.(Knight Ridder Newspapers)

Byline: Bob Ford

DOVER, Del. _ There was no easy racing as the raindrops spattered the concrete oval at Dover International Speedway Sunday during the MBNA Armed Forces Family 400, but there were plenty of hard feelings.

Hard feelings is what you get at more than 120 miles per hour when some fool decides to cut you off or tap your bumper, or some rulebook-toting race official decides to penalize you a full lap for a little-bitty infraction. Downright peeved is what you get, whether you are the one getting clipped or the one being clipboarded.

Winning races is pretty tough on the NASCAR Winston Cup circuit, but apparently, winning friends every week is nearly impossible.

That was evident when driver Sterling Marlin stood in the garage about a quarter of the way through the race looking at some nasty damage to his car. The body was caved in several ways, the natural result of sliding down a track backward, then colliding with an inside wall.

Marlin was rolling along in third place until the No. 24 car beneath him on the track, driven by Jeff Gordon, drifted close and tapped the left rear side of Marlin's car. Moments later, Marlin was going backward, and his day was going nowhere.

Meanwhile, Gordon, the driver everyone loves to hate, was going round and round the track on the way to a second-place finish.