Gordon, who won in 2012 from the 15th starting position and finished 10th from the pole previous year, disagreed with Busch.
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That win turned the final three weeks of his career into a whirlwind of party planning and preparing to host family and friends on Sunday. I think I’m a pretty laid-back and calm person.
Despite all the success he has enjoyed on the Sprint Cup circuit, Busch is still searching for his first championship, and it may very well come to pass Sunday. More than 20 years of Gordon winning races and dominating the headlines gave Smith plenty of material.
“That was big because of the wins, and how we dominated that season”, Gordon recalled Thursday, reflecting on his glorious career. What better way for him to potentially go out than by going out as a champion?
NASCAR’s previous 35 races have narrowed the championship contenders down to four. “We’ll learn from that when we got back and talk to Denny”. Two years ago? I would have been a mess. “After all, he’s ‘Jeff Gordon'”. Three Daytona 500s. Five Brickyard 400s.
There are certainly advantages and disadvantages to NASCAR’s current Chase for the Sprint Cup format, but perhaps the biggest positive of all will come to pass Sunday when four drivers compete for a championship at Homestead-Miami Speedway. He can do something no NASCAR star has ever done – go out a champion.
Snapshot: Simply making the Chase was an impressive feat given his injury, but he advanced to the final round thanks to three top-five finishes in the past three races. The reason I was able to win at so many different tracks was the consistency that our team had and that I had at all the different tracks….
Since announcing his retirement before this season, Gordon has been heaped with praise, honored with tribute after tribute and lavished with such outrageous gifts as a tour bus, streets named after him and even ponies for his two children. I’d say his numbers speak for themselves. “But it’s something you don’t really want to have to go through, that’s for sure”.
The first round was an adventure for championship contender Jeff Gordon, who needed two runs to advance to the second round. There were the fans who loved him, who were mostly young and female, and there were the fans who booed him loudly because they favored the old-school approach.
Gordon, Kyle Busch, Martin Truex Jr. and defending Sprint Cup champion Kevin Harvick are the only four drivers remaining in the Chase for the championship.
“That’s insane, that’s life changing”, he said. “That last one could have been a tiny bit better, but knowing that we had one extra lap on the tires, I’m very, very proud and happy with that run”. “It just feels right, doesn’t it?”
Gordon must earn that one, just as he did the other 93.
A Jeff Gordon victory would make national headlines because it would mean one of the sport’s true icons would basically score a walk-off in his final event.
NASCAR declined to finish the Phoenix race on Monday instead, but wasn’t as committal about the finale not being held over a day. “If you look back at NASCAR, there is always somebody who has kinda carried the deal”.
“He just connects with everybody”. You know, he’s been – he never did anything to alienate anyone. But he’s never been disrespectful to anyone or any driver. “What do you think of us now?'”
NASCAR Chairman Brian France recalls asking Gordon why he appeared on “Saturday Night Live” in 2003 – the only NASCAR driver ever to do so. Logano also became the first driver since Bobby Allison in 1994 to win three consecutive races in NASCAR’s premier circuit.
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“Yeah, I mean, things are good”. I’m just real happy about how we qualified. But out of the auto, Earnhardt ribbed Gordon a lot, especially after he narrowly lost an eighth championship when Gordon won his first. Jimmie Johnson did not have a good run, as he will start in 12th position. “He has been there for me, and I’ve been there for him”. A Truex championship would be the most surprising outcome. “Obviously with our effort today in qualifying, I think we showed how bad we all want it, to be better than just being here battling for the championship and it being my final race”, he said.
