A year ago, Jeff Gordon “won” the NASCAR Sprint Cup regular season, finishing the first 26 races an eye-popping 312 points ahead of runner-up Tony Stewart.
Gordon’s reward for his fast start? He saw his big margin disappear and found himself second at the start of the 10-race Chase for the championship, 20 points behind Hendrick Motorsports teammate Jimmie Johnson.
For the stock car postseason, the 12 eligible drivers are each boosted to 5,000 points, then seeded by victories, with 10 points for each win. In 2007, all the Chase drivers except Clint Bowyer had at least one win.
Johnson, who went on to win the title for the second straight year, got the points lead for his six victories to Gordon’s four entering the Chase.
If Kyle Busch, who leads the standings by 103 points over Jeff Burton heading to New Hampshire this week, stays out front, he’s not likely to meet Gordon’s fate. The new Joe Gibbs Racing driver already has five victories and only fourth-place Carl Edwards, with three, is close.
At the moment, the only other multiple race winner is ninth-place Kasey Kahne with two. Among the top 12, Burton, Dale Earnhardt Jr., Johnson, Denny Hamlin and Bowyer each have one win, while Gordon, Greg Biffle, Tony Stewart and Matt Kenseth have none.
“It would be nice to have some wins in our pocket at this point, but the main thing is to be in the Chase,” said sixth-place Gordon.
And that is definitely the first order of business.
With 10 weeks of regular-season racing left, there are still plenty of question marks. Just 79 points separate Bowyer in 10th place and rookie David Ragan in 14th.
“I’m not super comfortable with where we are at in the points,” said Kahne, just 34 points in front of Bowyer. “We definitely need to keep staying after it and keep gaining points and doing everything we can to stay in the top 12.
“We definitely have a lot of work to get in (the Chase) and there are a lot of good cars still on the outside and right behind us. (But) there are a lot of good tracks coming up for us. We’ve been fast at a lot of the upcoming tracks.”
Even Burton, who has been at or near the front of the points from the start of the season, isn’t taking anything for granted.
“Obviously, as the races get closer to two or three to go before the last 10, we’ve got a tremendous amount of emphasis put on it,” the four-time New Hampshire winner said. “However, we can’t forget that they pay the same amount of points for the third race of the year as they do for the 25th race of the year.
“So all the work that we’ve done up to this point is what matters, and every race by itself matters a great deal. The emphasis will be put on these closing races. At the end of the day, it’s an accumulation of all the points you gained in the first 26, so it really doesn’t make that race any more important than any other.”
MOVING UP: While everyone has been watching Kyle Busch and Kasey Kahne streak to wins lately, it’s Matt Kenseth who has been making the biggest inroads in the standings.
Coming back from a slow start, the 2003 Cup champion has surged from 22nd in the points to 12th in the past six races, scoring more points (934) than any other driver in the series during that period.
“I don’t know if it’s ever too early to look at it,” Kenseth said of the standings. “You always look at it on the way home, especially if you’re moving up, to see where you’re at and see what happened. But, the bottom line is really you do the best you can every week, and try to finish as high as you can and try to lead laps and do all that and the points take care of themselves.
“The higher you finish, the more points you get. So, really, it’s not a strategy, when you race hard and try to be smart and do the right things and, hopefully, get some good finishes and get back in it.”
Kenseth and Jimmie Johnson are the only drivers who have qualified for the Chase every year since it began in 2004.
GOOD CHEMISTRY: Coming off his first road course victory last Sunday at Infineon Raceway in Sonoma, Calif., series leader Kyle Busch is about as confident of his Joe Gibbs Racing team as a driver can get.
“It doesn’t surprise me that we’ve jelled this quickly, but it does surprise me that we already have five wins,” said Busch, who was dropped by Hendrick Motorsports last year to make room for Dale Earnhardt Jr., and quickly found his way to the No. 18 Gibbs Toyota.
“When you switch teams and come to a new organization, and working with a new crew chief, it can be challenging,” the 23-year-old driver said. “When (crew chief) Steve (Addington) and I first started working together, I was really descriptive about telling him what the car was doing. I was telling him what the right-front was doing and all, getting into a lot of detail. Now, I’ve toned back and just tell him it’s tight and he fixes it.
“He gets what I mean, so we’ve come a long way as far as chemistry. I’ve come a long way with everyone at JGR, for that matter. Also, Toyota and JGR have come a long way together this year with their engines and development and our cars. It’s not just one factor that has made us successful. It’s just a combination of all the hard work from the guys at the shop and all the guys on the (No.) 18 Interstate Batteries team at the race track each weekend.”
But Busch said there is still room for improvement.
“I’ve learned in this sport that if you become complacent, it just gives everyone else an opportunity to catch back up with you,” he explained. “There’s room for a football player to get better. (New England’s) Tom Brady could still get better, even though he’s certainly seems to be at the top of his game. There are so many things you can learn each race, each game, each week that can help you later in the season and even later on in your career.
“I’m still learning those things every time I set foot at the race track. For me, it’s been all about taking what I learn each week and putting it to good use. It’s part of what has made us successful as a team this year.”
STAT OF THE WEEK: Two-time Cup champion Tony Stewart is 11th in the points and without a victory in the first 16 races this season. But the notoriously slow starter may be about ready to make his move.
In four of the last five seasons, it took Stewart at last 14 races for his first victory, and it is the next 10 tracks, starting with New Hampshire, where Stewart generally has had the most success. His combined career numbers at the upcoming tracks include 18 of his 32 career victories, 59 top-fives, 91 top-10s and an average finish of 13.2.
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