Gordon just loves winning

FORT WORTH, Texas – Jeff Gordon, Jeff Gordon. You would have thought that after four NASCAR Nextel Cup Series championships, 70 victories, a high-profile divorce and all sorts of nasty rumors on the Web, there would be little new to learn about – or even ask – the stock-car superstar.

But one such inquiry surfaced Tuesday, when Gordon took a few moments from the whirlwind surrounding his victory in Sunday’s season-opening Daytona 500 to catch up with the national motor sports media.

Let’s back up here a moment. One of the events designed to entertain and inform a media corps held hostage during Speedweeks 2005 at Daytona International Speedway was a bus tour of historic NASCAR sites in and around the Daytona Beach/Ormond Beach area – the self-proclaimed “Birthplace of Speed.”

Junior Johnson, one of the NASCAR pioneers on the bus, allowed that if he still was a team owner, Gordon would be his driver.

Wow … that rates as high praise from Johnson, whose background as chicken farmer/moonshine runner/stock-car legend from North Wilkesboro, N.C., inspired the classic essay “The Last American Hero”.

Johnson then was asked if Gordon would have made a good whiskey runner … back in the day of the Ford Tudor sedan with souped-up V-8 stuffed underneath its hood.

Johnson said no, that Gordon probably would have had a heart attack the first time the “gumball” red light atop a police car flashed in his rearview on a darkened, twisted strip of Carolina asphalt.

Gordon thought about it for a moment and said such an experience must have been a rush.

“But I agree with him; I don’t think I would have made a very good (whiskey runner),” Gordon said. “I don’t like running from the law. Definitely not what got me into driving a race car.”

A couple of hours after claiming his third Daytona 500 victory, Gordon reminded us what makes him tick.

“You know, I learned quite a while ago that it’s not racing that I love, it’s winning,” Gordon said. In terms Johnson could appreciate, Gordon separated the egg from the shell, implying that the road to any Cup championship still runs through him and the No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet.

Gordon even smirked about it Sunday, when a reporter framed a post-race question by stating that many media members had picked him to win the second edition of the Chase for the NASCAR Nextel Cup.

“I thought everybody picked Jimmie Johnson,” Gordon deadpanned, a reference to Johnson’s emergence as consensus choice to displace Kurt Busch as Cup champion. “I was wanting to still stay under the radar. Am I not under the radar?”

As one who picked Johnson – Gordon’s protege and Hendrick teammate – to win the 2005 title, all I can say is … nice shot!

Thanks for the reminder. Yes, Busch is likely to find out how difficult it is to repeat as Cup champion, a feat last accomplished by Sir Jeff in 1997-98. True, Dale Earnhardt Jr. has transcended his worshipers in NASCAR Nation to a place alongside mainstream American icons Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods and A-Rod. And, surely, even Gordon would agree that Johnson is a Cup champion in waiting.

But Gordon still is the guy who makes NASCAR go round and round.

Gordon is the guy whose love-him-or-hate-him persona fits the blueprint for success that has produced NASCAR legends ranging from Curtis Turner to Darrell Waltrip to Dale Earnhardt.

Gordon is the guy who – while not being quite as “edgy” as Little E – can show up and be quite comfortable cooking pasta and chatting on “Live with Regis and Kelly,” where he can make nice with NASCAR’s growing female demographic.

Gordon is the guy Fox’s cameras conveniently found schmoozing in a private box at the Super Bowl, giving the network the perfect opportunity to shill its upcoming coverage of “The Great American Race.”

So much for flying under the radar. Gordon is the guy sitting atop the points standings, after yet another milestone win.