Jeff Gordon
Jeff Gordon
Jeffery Michael "Jeff" Gordonis an American semi-retired professional stock car racing driver and currently an announcer for Fox NASCAR. He formerly drove the No. 24 Chevrolet for Hendrick Motorsports in 23 full-time NASCAR Sprint Cup Series seasons between 1993 and 2015, and currently serves as a substitute driver for Dale Earnhardt Jr. in the No. 88 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionRace Car Driver
Date of Birth4 August 1971
CityVallejo, CA
CountryUnited States of America
To me, it's going to come down to driving our hearts out, doing everything we can and then trying to get ourselves in the best position.
Honestly, I've been going up in that trailer for 10 years now . . . and I feel like very little of it ever really makes an impact. I sat there many times with Dale, and I heard him make his points, and I knew he had a special relationship with Bill (France) Jr., and NASCAR and I felt like, sometimes he definitely made a difference, sometimes he got credit for it when I think they were already going to do something and half the time they didn't do anything.
I thought there was no way Jimmie could win the race, or I wouldn't have left. All of a sudden I hear he wins, and I go, 'You've got to be kidding me?' That was just a phenomenal win.
For some reason, no matter what happens in my life, I always seem to have a piece of my heart that says everything is going to be okay.
I'm sure I'm not going to be the sweetest and nicest person to work with in that car. Every moment is going to be intense.
I'm sure he didn't mean to do it and all that stuff, but I wasn't happy about it. I showed it to him after the race. I like racing with Matt ... that stuff rarely happens with him. But I'm going to give it back what he gives to me.
I know people have asked me, 'Why haven't you done that? Why haven't you done that?' I've never really felt like it was my place to do that. I feel like over the years that I've been here that I've earned more respect, but I don't know if I'll ever have the type of respect that Dale had.
I know where I'm going, but I don't know what I'm going to do. I'm going to the mountains. I haven't made any plans. I'm just going to play it by ear -- me and my girlfriend. We're also testing at Richmond.
I like Matt. I like racing with him. I didn't like racing him today.
It's still a game of Russian Roulette. There are so many cars fighting for the same piece of real estate that it's easy to get caught up in someone else's accident.
It's not as bad as it used to be in Turn 4, but Turn 2 is pretty extreme. The way you come off the corner, you've got nice banking but then it really flattens off. ...It just makes your car want to drift to the wall. That makes it really difficult to get side-by-side.
That is what happened to us, I think. At the beginning of the year we went more toward them. ... But I've been telling them all year that I can't drive it like that. You put the same thing underneath me (that Johnson had), and I don't like it.
They've got to do what they've got to do. I've always done it that way. We led the most laps, but when it came time to get the win, they did everything they could.
The retirement package that was available for my almost 32 years of employment will vanish before many others and myself are eligible to receive it, if this new plan is implemented.