NASCAR Cup Series

Gordon feels what it's like to win again

Published Feb. 28, 2011 3:23 a.m. ET

foxsports

For Jeff Gordon, it was all about savoring the moment.

After 66 races without a win, Gordon returned to Victory Lane in Sunday’s Subway Fresh Fit 500 at Phoenix International Raceway.

"Are you kidding me? Pinch me man, pinch me,” Gordon said when he got out of the car. “God, it feels so amazing. I can't tell you how amazing this feels.”

Gordon clinched his 83rd career victory in dominating fashion. He led six times for a total of 138 laps and beat Kyle Busch to the line by 1.137 seconds to win and move into a tie with Cale Yarborough for fifth on the all-time win list.

But his disbelief of outrunning Busch — and foiling his former Hendrick Motorsports teammate’s sweep of the weekend’s events — was a stark expression of the four-time champion’s humility.

“Man, we just beat Kyle Busch,” Gordon said over the radio. “Thank you boss, I love these guys.”

And there was a lot of love to go around. Gordon, 39, seemed invigorated during Speedweeks with the crew changes Rick Hendrick made in the offseason. After six seasons with Steve Letarte at the helm of the No. 24 team, Alan Gustafson was paired with Gordon in November.

While the team didn’t put up the results they had hoped for at Daytona and struggled on new tires during practice and in qualifying on Saturday, by 50 laps into Sunday’s race Gordon told the crew he had “a real awesome race car” that he felt he could “do a lot with.” The veteran slammed the wall during the Kyle Busch/Carl Edwards melee on Lap 60, but Gordon didn’t damage the No. 24 Chevrolet structurally. He made a four-tire stop and dropped to 34th. Before the red-flag caution on Lap 66 — triggered by an altercation between Matt Kenseth and Brian Vickers — Gordon battled through traffic to the 18th position, stayed out on the track while the field pitted then moved into third for the restart on Lap 72.

Gordon had issues with debris on his grille, but never faded from the top five after that. Busch blasted off on the final restart of the race on Lap 291 before Gordon caught the No. 18 car 14 laps later.

“I didn't know what to expect,” Gordon said. “I got into (Turn) 1 and he was right on my door and I got loose and got up into him, they said clear, I went because I knew I needed to get away from him as fast as I could.”

Gordon said he prayed the white flag would appear before a race-extending caution as his emotions began to creep in. Not only did Gordon get his wish, the resounding response from the fans simply blew him away.

“I was feeling the emotions, but to see (the fans) react like that. Then the push truck pushed me around and to see them all the way down (the frontstretch) doing that, I was like, ‘I don't know if I've ever experienced something like that.’ And that to me made it all worth it right there to have that feeling.”

For Gordon, it was the feeling of being on top — again.

Fueling the feud

When Kyle Busch’s car became loose on Lap 59, it was an extremely costly mistake — not for the No. 18 car, but for Carl Edwards, who certainly had a car capable of winning the race.

“I’m not exactly sure what happened,” Edwards said. “I’ll have to talk to Kyle about it. I thought at first he was just frustrated and he turned left to get back in line and he didn’t know I was there, but I watched the tape and I think he really did get loose. He hit me hard and I was left with nothing. I got rammed to the infield.

“(My race car) is the fastest car at the racetrack. It’s just a shame it’s on jack stands.”

On Lap 116, Edwards returned to action 56 laps behind the leaders. And he was going to make his presence known to Busch — even if it took a while to reach him.

Busch came over the radio to the crew as Edwards roughed him up.

“Once is OK,” Busch said. “Five times? C’mon man.”

After his win on Saturday, Busch surmised that despite Edwards already “owing him one” he believed his competitor raced him clean because it was still early in the season. Busch, who assumed the points lead after finishing second on Sunday, was contrite in his postrace comments.

“It was a real big mistake on my part and the first person I have to apologize to is Carl Edwards,” Busch said. “It just got out from underneath me and we were getting bounced around like a ping pong ball there for a while. I got into him and just killed his day.

“I know he was frustrated and I could tell out there on the racetrack. I apologize, I don’t know how many times. It was unintentional, especially for the way we raced yesterday.”

Edwards finished 28th and dropped from the points lead to 12th.

Junior gaining

Jeff Gordon wasn’t the only driver that gained from a crew chief change at Hendrick Motorsports. Dale Earnhardt Jr. posted his first top-10 finish since his seventh-place run at Martinsville Speedway last October.

Earnhardt qualified 35th and battled through the 13-car wreck on Lap 66, a bump and grind with David Gilliland and a loose wheel on Lap 241 which mired him to 23rd in the field.

Earnhardt battled back to the lead lap and a solid 10th-place finish.

“We still have a little ways to go but we had a pretty good car,” Earnhardt said. “The biggest problem we had was qualifying poorly, trying to overcome that all day. We had a good enough car to run with them guys and kind of proved it in a couple of instances. But, you have to get by them. You get stuck behind them and it’s hard to really show how good the car is. Every time we passed somebody, we just left them.

“Steve (Letarte, crew chief) did a good job. The guys did a good job in the pits. Everybody helped prepare the car all weekend. We did pretty good. We just have to keep working hard and thinking like we are and just try to do better. But, definitely, a step in the right direction.

Say what?

When Jeff Gordon was asked if he cried following the win:

“Well give me your definition of cry? There were no tears. The chin was shaking. I had to check myself. You’ve seen the boo-hooing. There was no boo-hoo crying. (My wife) has not been able to experience all of the wins. To go through a lot of things with her and the conversations that we’ve had, when I saw her, I knew that was going to get me … so that got me a little bit.”