Gordon aims to win at Sears Point
SONOMA, Calif. (AP) – Jeff Gordon has been so good on road courses that defending champion Tony Stewart figures his victory last year in the Dodge/Save Mart 350 might have been an aberration. “When Jeff walks through the garage area at road course races I think we all felt we were supposed to kneel on one knee,” Stewart said. “I don’t think anybody dethroned the man by any means.”
Gordon jokingly said he’d expect the kneel Sunday at Sears Point Raceway, where Stewart has won the only race that Gordon hasn’t in the past four years.
Armed with a new, specially designed road-course car, Gordon aims to win his first race of the season on the twists and turns of the track in California’s scenic wine country track.
While it’s still the first half of the season and Gordon is tied with teammate Jimmie Johnson in second place behind leader Sterling Marlin in the Winston Cup point standings, he’d like to get that first checkered flag.
“It’s frustrating,” Gordon said. “I think there were a few races where I felt we had a car to win, and either I messed it up, or a caution fell at the wrong time.”
Gordon appears to have a distinct advantage whether in Sonoma or at Watkins Glen, the only other road course on NASCAR circuit.
The four-time Winston Cup champion reeled off six straight road-course victories, starting at Watkins Glen in 1997. The string was broken on the New York course in 2000 – and then Stewart won last year at Sears Point.
Gordon came back to win again at Watkins Glen last August, giving him the record for career road-course victories with seven.
In nine career starts at Sears Point, Gordon has three wins, three poles, six top-five finishes and seven top-10s.
But with the loss last year to Stewart, Gordon decided he was falling behind and that this year he would debut a new Chevrolet. He tested it at Virginia International Raceway and was pleased with the results.
Still, Gordon said knows his task will be difficult Sunday on the 10-turn, two-mile course.
“This is not any easy place to win,” he said. “It doesn’t just happen just because you’ve won races in the past.”
Last year, Gordon had the pole for the race and led the first 32 laps. But Stewart, who qualified third, slipped under Robby Gordon while exiting the track’s famed Chute and led the final 10 laps for the win.
While acknowledging his defending champion status gives him a measure of confidence entering this weekend’s race, Stewart is more concerned about his performances so far this June. Last weekend in Brooklyn, Mich., Stewart finished a disappointing 16th in the Sirius Satellite 400.
“The way we’ve run in the last few weeks, if we’re not the leader when we take the checkered flag, we need to at least be able to see the leader take the checkered flag,” said Stewart, who has two victories this year.