Motorsports

Halfway to history

By BRANT JAMES, Times Staff Writer
Published October 16, 2007

ADVERTISEMENT [Getty Images] Jeff Gordon, driver of the No. 24 DuPont Chevrolet, celebrates in victory lane after winning the NASCAR Nextel Cup Series Bank of America 500 Saturday at Lowe's Motor Speedway in Concord, N.C.

Somewhere in an industrial park Sunday, a T-shirt factory likely whirred into activity. There would be a pirated image of Jeff Gordon from the Internet, low thread-count cotton and garish colors. The slogan "Drive for Five" would complete this unlicensed ensemble.   No, Gordon's second straight win during the Chase for the Championship didn't mathematically seal his fifth title at NASCAR's highest level Saturday night in Concord, N.C. But it's getting him close enough for those who benefit from such events to maybe put away those "Repeat"Jimmie Johnson silk screens. But Gordon's apparently going to wait before green-lighting the official merchandise.  "There's no doubt that this team has an amazing chemistry about it," he said. "We have some great things that are going our way. Call it luck, karma, whatever you want to call it. There's some great things happening, but there are still five races to go, and all that has to continue in order for us to get this championship."

Winners

1 Jeff Gordon: He finished 21 of 26 "regular season" races as the points leader. It would have been 22 had the reseed by victories not vaporized a 317-point lead to begin the Chase for the Championship. But he has held the top perch for four of five "playoff" races. His six wins, series-best 19 top fives and amazing 25 top 10s in 31 races make up an amazing body of work.

2. Jimmie Johnson: Although he didn't win for the fourth time in the past eight races at Lowe's Motor Speedway, the defending series champion and his crew again proved masters of triage because of a mishap after leading 95 early laps. Johnson spun alone (but sustained little damage) on Lap 230, fell to 29th after pitting for new tires and fuel but used another speedy car to move through the field to finish 14th. The result would have been even better had he not needed to pit in the final laps for a precautionary splash of fuel because of a vapor-lock issue. Johnson fell from nine to 68 points back of his Hendrick Motorsports teammate but held second.

3 Clint Bowyer: The second-year Cup driver had a brief chance to pass Jeff Gordon on the last restart but held on for second - his third finish of second or better in the Chase - and third in the standings, just 78 back.

Losers

1 Tony Stewart: The fourth-place driver is 198 points behind Gordon with five races remaining after finishing seventh Saturday. The most a driver can make up on another in one race is 161. That's fairly discouraging considering he has four top 10s in the Chase after a runnerup finish at Richmond. The circumstances behind those otherwise reasonable results have been even more discouraging for the two-time series champion. A gamble on a fender rub led to a blown tire, crash and 39th-place finish for a No. 20 Chevrolet that led laps at Kansas; an attempt to block Johnson and a draft miscalculation late at Talladega cost him a likely top-five finish and possibly a win; another pit road collision - with Kasey Kahne and again with Paul Menard - fouled a stout car Saturday night.

2 Everybody else.

What we learned

Tony Stewart isn't likely to mount a bid for another Nextel Cup title after all.

Big picture

Jeff Gordon has won four of the past nine at Martinsville, site of Sunday's race, but couldn't wrestle himself around Jimmie Johnson on the final laps this spring. Johnson has won three of his 11 starts there, and two straight, which likely sets up another tussle atop the standings. Clint Bowyer's best finish at Martinsville was 11th this spring, so he will be pressed to keep the three-man vanguard atop the standings intact.

ARCA angel

Frank Kimmel has ruled the minor-league ARCA series so long he has a certain idea of how things should run.

When a trophy presentation wasn't meeting that standard at Talladega, he instructed the photographers to snap their shots and move aside then prompted the moderator to allow the recipient a few words. Might as well run the news conferences. He's still running the series on the track.

The 55-year-old Indianan won his record ninth (eighth straight) series title this weekend at Toledo, Ohio.

"We struggled this year with all kinds of adversity. We didn't have a sponsor, and despite the problems we had the team stuck together, and it was good to be able to win a ninth championship," he said.

Kimmel has 207 top-five finishes and 258 top 10s in 349 starts since 1990, all records.

SPARK PLUGS: Last week, Indy Racing League teams tested the paddle shifting and steering mechanism to be used in 2008 at Barber Motorsports Park outside Birmingham, Ala. ...Michael Cherry, an 18-year-old from Valrico competing Monday and today in NASCAR's "Drive for Diversity" combine at South Boston (Va.) Speedway, raised his national profile as a guest on The Morning Drive Sirius radio show Monday. ... Funny how things come full circle. Zephyrhills' David Reutimann, a Nextel Cup rookie with Michael Waltrip Racing, once worked as a "jumper," running packages from UPS delivery trucks to front doors as a teenager. Next year he will replace Dale Jarrett after five points races as driver of the No. 44 Toyota at MWR sponsored by the package-delivery giant.

[Last modified October 16, 2007, 11:57:38]