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
It was a long day. I think we had a shot a top 10 with that tore-up race car.
You know, we really are going to have to be as on top of our game this weekend as we've ever been. You know, certainly we're capable of that, I know that we are. We haven't shown that this year, so I'm hoping that when it is all on the line that we do step it up. I know the team is capable of doing that.
When I first came in the sport, it was sort of like his time to be the top guy. I don't think he was expecting a young guy ... to come out as strong as we did and become as popular as we did. He and I kind of had a rivalry starting in 1994 and it carried on for a number of years.
I don't carry any grudges. I know that in order to finish in the top five you have to make as many friends as you possibly can and stay out of trouble out there. I had a pretty incident-free race out there today.
We're not in the top 10 battling for the championship -- it doesn't matter to me where we finish. It's where we finish each race to get ourselves prepared for next year.
It was really a cool day to be able to get back in the top five and have something for those guys.
We had a top five that would have been a great finish and it was taken away from us. I'm sure he didn't mean to do it and all that stuff, but I wasn't happy about it.
There's always pressure on everyone. It doesn't matter if you're trying to get into the top 35 in points or just trying to make the race or make the top 10, or if you're leading the points and trying to win a championship. There's extreme pressure throughout the field. You might be in a position where you don't know if you have a ride next year, you might not have a sponsor. There's always pressure on all of us.
He's tough here, there's no doubt about it. When I look at guys that run good here, I put him as one of the top guys.
I'm curious to see, once they lock in the top 10, how aggressive they're going to be. To win a championship, you really have to go for it. You can't be out there racing for points every week.
I do believe in karma, but I also do believe in consistency. If you are running in the top five week in and week out, you'll put yourself in position to eventually get into Victory Lane.
We just want to be able to focus on our program, on our people, on what we have to do to be as strong as we can as a team to compete for wins, compete for championships, and build that together without there being too many outside distractions. If we ever say we want to go under the radar, that's what we're trying to do.
The Roush cars are really, really fast right now.
I've worked with Steve for more than 10 years and we already communicate extremely well, both on and off the track. The team has a ton of confidence in his abilities, so we're looking forward to the last 10 races of 2005 and getting an early jump on next year.