Mark Martin said he won’t race at Bristol, Tenn., next week. And that’s his final answer. But that’s coming from a driver who’s announced two different retirements, only to still be racing.

Martin leads the Nextel Cup Series standings heading into Sunday’s Kobalt Tools 500 at the Atlanta Motor Speedway, but he will give it away - as well as any chance to win his first NASCAR championship - when he skips next week’s race to maintain his self-imposed part-time schedule.

“There’s other things to talk about,” Martin said Friday. “Seriously, there’s other things to talk about that might even be more fun. I’ll be happy to get that behind. But the biggest thing is that I love what I do and I want to continue to love it. There’s been times in the last few years that I didn’t love what I was doing and I don’t want to ever feel that way again. I don’t want to ever feel that way again about something that I love with the kind of passion that I have. So I need a break.”

Savannah Morning News

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