By JEFF WOLF
REVIEW-JOURNAL

Rusty Wallace enjoyed the fanfare of winning a NASCAR Nextel Cup Series race for the first time in nearly three years, and his teammate, Las Vegan Brendan Gaughan, also was smiling after Sunday's race in Martinsville, Va.

Gaughan finished 17th, his best effort in his eight Cup races.

"We've been saying it all year; we're going to keep getting better," said Gaughan, whose previous best finish was 19th in Daytona Beach, Fla.

But he seemed more pleased with Wallace's victory.

"That's just so cool to have him win, get off that schneid," Gaughan said. "To have Rusty back in the winner's circle, to watch him back in form, I don't think it's going to be the last (time)."

The other Las Vegan in the field, Kurt Busch, finished 11th but lost his series points lead to Dale Earnhardt Jr.

"We were just struggling," Busch said. "We were real loose to start the race and we never recovered from that. We went from fourth to 25th and just kept piecing it together all day from one stop to another."