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Sprint Cup
CUP: Good Times For Gordon
Jeff Gordon comes into Pocono second in points...
Jeff Gordon greets fans at Pocono. (Photo: LAT Photographic)
These are hectic, but happy times for Jeff Gordon, the four-time NASCAR Sprint Cup champion.
Gordon and wife Ingrid Vandebosch are about to become parents for the second time, with a baby boy scheduled to join the family some time this month.
On the racing side, Gordon’s got a new spotter, Jeff Dickerson, who moved over from Kyle Busch’s No. 18 Joe Gibbs Racing squad and Aric Almirola on hand as a back-up driver in case Gordon is called into daddy duty this weekend. On Friday, it was announced that Gordon’s long-time crew chief Steve Letarte had signed a long-term contract extension.
And so far at Pocono Raceway, things have gone well for Gordon. He qualified fourth for the Sunoco Red Cross Pennsylvania 500, and in Saturday morning’s first round of practice his iconic No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet topped the speed charts.
Although Gordon has more top-five finishes this season than any of his peers in the Cup Series, the goal over the next six weeks is simple: Just win, baby.
At this point in the season, Gordon is a virtual lock to make the Chase for the Sprint Cup. When the Chase field is set after the Richmond race, each of the 12 drivers contesting the championship will have his point total reset to 5,000 plus 10 points for every race victory. Right now, Jimmie Johnson and Denny Hamlin have 50 bonus points each, while Kevin Harvick and the Busch brothers have 20. Gordon? Zero, something he’s aiming to change.
“We don't want to go into the Chase, you know, say, second in points at Richmond and then go to New Hampshire and we're eighth or ninth in points,” said Gordon. “You just don't want to give up 40, 50, 60 points to guys like the 48 (Johnson) or the 11 (Hamlin) and the 29 (Harvick) and these guys.”
That said, Gordon is optimistic about his odds of finally completing the “drive for five,” his ongoing search for a fifth title to go with the ones he won in 1995, ’97, 98 and 2001.
Asked if he could win another title without winning a race this season, Gordon was clear.
“Absolutely. Finish second every weekend and you can win the championship,” he said. “I mean, I think it can be done. It hasn't yet. But, I mean, I believe you're going to need to win a race to win the championship. I believe that. And I think we're capable of that. But I can promise you, we're going to do everything we can to get the best finish we can every weekend and see where we end up. ... I'm going to be disappointed if we don't win a race before the Chase. But I still think we've got an excellent shot at winning the championship even if we don't win a race.”
Gordon said he isn’t going to let his season be defined by whether or not he wins a race.
“We're still second in points,” he said. “I was reading the paper the other day that had a bunch of stats. We're in the top two or three of about every important stat out there. Those are all very positive things. The only thing that's really eluding us right now is a win or two.”
And Gordon is going for it this weekend, just as he always does.
“The urgency is always there to try to win every race,” Gordon said. “ ... Every race you go into, that's our plan, that's our objective. Just because it doesn't happen doesn't mean that we create urgency (that) we have to do it. We just go to the next race and go through the same steps to try to win.”
Tom Jensen is the Editor in Chief of SPEED.com, Senior NASCAR Editor at RACER and a contributing Editor for TruckSeries.com. You can follow him online at twitter.com/tomjensen100 and e-mail him at Jensen is the author of “Cheating: The Bad Things Good NASCAR Nextel Cup Racers Do In Pursuit of Speed,” and has appeared on numerous television and radio shows. Jensen is the past President of the National Motorsports Press Association and an NMPA Writer of the Year.
Gordon and wife Ingrid Vandebosch are about to become parents for the second time, with a baby boy scheduled to join the family some time this month.
On the racing side, Gordon’s got a new spotter, Jeff Dickerson, who moved over from Kyle Busch’s No. 18 Joe Gibbs Racing squad and Aric Almirola on hand as a back-up driver in case Gordon is called into daddy duty this weekend. On Friday, it was announced that Gordon’s long-time crew chief Steve Letarte had signed a long-term contract extension.
And so far at Pocono Raceway, things have gone well for Gordon. He qualified fourth for the Sunoco Red Cross Pennsylvania 500, and in Saturday morning’s first round of practice his iconic No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet topped the speed charts.
Although Gordon has more top-five finishes this season than any of his peers in the Cup Series, the goal over the next six weeks is simple: Just win, baby.
At this point in the season, Gordon is a virtual lock to make the Chase for the Sprint Cup. When the Chase field is set after the Richmond race, each of the 12 drivers contesting the championship will have his point total reset to 5,000 plus 10 points for every race victory. Right now, Jimmie Johnson and Denny Hamlin have 50 bonus points each, while Kevin Harvick and the Busch brothers have 20. Gordon? Zero, something he’s aiming to change.
“We don't want to go into the Chase, you know, say, second in points at Richmond and then go to New Hampshire and we're eighth or ninth in points,” said Gordon. “You just don't want to give up 40, 50, 60 points to guys like the 48 (Johnson) or the 11 (Hamlin) and the 29 (Harvick) and these guys.”
That said, Gordon is optimistic about his odds of finally completing the “drive for five,” his ongoing search for a fifth title to go with the ones he won in 1995, ’97, 98 and 2001.
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Asked if he could win another title without winning a race this season, Gordon was clear.
“Absolutely. Finish second every weekend and you can win the championship,” he said. “I mean, I think it can be done. It hasn't yet. But, I mean, I believe you're going to need to win a race to win the championship. I believe that. And I think we're capable of that. But I can promise you, we're going to do everything we can to get the best finish we can every weekend and see where we end up. ... I'm going to be disappointed if we don't win a race before the Chase. But I still think we've got an excellent shot at winning the championship even if we don't win a race.”
Gordon said he isn’t going to let his season be defined by whether or not he wins a race.
“We're still second in points,” he said. “I was reading the paper the other day that had a bunch of stats. We're in the top two or three of about every important stat out there. Those are all very positive things. The only thing that's really eluding us right now is a win or two.”
And Gordon is going for it this weekend, just as he always does.
“The urgency is always there to try to win every race,” Gordon said. “ ... Every race you go into, that's our plan, that's our objective. Just because it doesn't happen doesn't mean that we create urgency (that) we have to do it. We just go to the next race and go through the same steps to try to win.”
Tom Jensen is the Editor in Chief of SPEED.com, Senior NASCAR Editor at RACER and a contributing Editor for TruckSeries.com. You can follow him online at twitter.com/tomjensen100 and e-mail him at Jensen is the author of “Cheating: The Bad Things Good NASCAR Nextel Cup Racers Do In Pursuit of Speed,” and has appeared on numerous television and radio shows. Jensen is the past President of the National Motorsports Press Association and an NMPA Writer of the Year.
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