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Once in a great while, even in NASCAR, things work.

Such a night was Sunday, when Darlington Raceway, that obsolete, misshapen track closer to the deep, blue sea than the devil, put the entire sport on its aging shoulders and rescued it from a self-induced coma.

Carl Edwards, that splendid driver and amateur acrobat, won for the first time at The Lady in Black in The Granddaddy of Them All, and the entire evening, which nearly spilled over into Labor Day, was decidedly Too Tough to Tame.

Darlington has more nicknames than Babe Ruth. Sometimes the nicknames don't work out. Danica Patrick arrived in the Pee Dee (a river) with a Chevrolet that was mostly black, and even though she was properly clothed, it was still too tough to tame.

Worth a shot, though.

Some will grouse. Some will say the Bojangles Southern 500 had too many caution flags and took too long. They will blame a caution flag for Edwards winning instead of Brad Keselowski, but Edwards' crew beat Keselowski's in getting his car properly serviced, and it was fairer and squarer than a victory framed by free passes, wave-arounds or insufficient ethanol.

When eight pages remained in War and Peace, Edwards took off like a scalded Camry, and Keselowski had to settle for "it was still a good night for the Miller High Life Fusion."

Edwards cut a flip, a near-capacity crowd roared, and many in the infield lowered their flags and went home happy.

Not only was Darlington on Labor Day Weekend again, but all else in the firmament was fairly well aligned and organized. Most of the oddities associated with a track layout that seemed state-of-the-art when Truman was president were in place.

The cars could demonstrably be seen sliding through the turns.

What?

Tire wear was such that cars that had been really slow until they pitted became really fast for a few laps, at times going so far as to pass heretofore faster cars with fleeting ease.       Little-known fact: Darlington is actually paved in sandpaper.

For many fans, the word "downforce" might as well be Maltese for "evil incarnate." Maltese for "downforce" -- I must look it up because it's so easy on one of these contraptions -- is "stabbiliti fissehh," of course, and while there is no precise Maltese for "evil incarnate," "very bad" is "tassew hazin."

Don't worry. There won't be a pop quiz.

Next year, if NASCAR officials have a lick of sense, which has been debatable for roughly the 11 years since Darlington was stripped of one race date and sent wandering around the calendar with the other, they will use this low-downforce package at every track that is a mile or more with banking, except Daytona and Talladega, and the Lords of Daytona could do worse than chopping off the spoilers everywhere.

They won't. They'll probably come up with some assortment of designer setups because it will make them all seem more intelligent. Somewhere in Akron, Ohio, engineers sigh.

A race can be long if it's not boring. Forget the color schemes. They were fine. Forget Ken Squier and Ned Jarrett in the TV booth. It was fun. By all means, forget the leisure suits.

Remember the races. Once upon a time, the people who ran Darlington, back before International Speedway Corporation, used to coat the asphalt in what they called "bear grease." They wanted the cars to be a handful to drive. They wanted them to slip and slide. Too many tracks look as if they installed railroad tracks.

Edwards won, but he also survived a grueling night of treachery and deceit. Too many wrecks? Oh, yeah. Too long? Rumor has it that some of the drivers worked up a sweat and hydrated all the way home in their helicopters.

Easy is against every reason for Darlington's existence and to the republic for which it stands.

It's the Little Egg That Could. "Egg" in Maltese is "hajd."