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Confessions of an Ex Gordon-Hater
by Steve Wingate, TCGOB Publisher

Okay, I admit it... a few years back, I was a Jeff Gordon basher.  I hated everything about him-- his "squeaky-clean" image, his well-financed team, his incredible crew chief, his fashion model wife, you name it, I hated it.  And the fact that he was a winning driver made it that much worse.  In my opinion, race car drivers never went around looking like they blow-dried their hair and had their teeth professionally whitened... not that I thought race car drivers should have missing teeth, greasy hair and dirt under their fingernails.  I just thought drivers should look more like Dale Earnhardt-- tough and rugged with a determined glint in their eyes.

Then one day I came to the realization that I spent a lot more time and energy hating Gordon than I did cheering Earnhardt or the other drivers I admired.  I had also had a chance to cruise the Internet and see some of the ridiculous, illiterate and inarticulate "Gordon Haters" web sites out there.  I was apalled and did not want to share views with the folks who ran those sites, so I decided to change my ways and look at Jeff Gordon a little differently by disregarding his image and looking at him the same way I did everyone else.  What you see when you cast away the squeaky clean image is amazing.  With 58 career wins 4 championships as of this writing, he falls into an elite group that includes names like Petty, Pearson, Waltrip, Allison and Earnhardt.  (And of that group, only Earnhardt and Petty possess 4+ championships.)  If Gordon continues the way he is going, he could very well wrap up his career being second only to Richard Petty in total number of wins and championships.

I'm far from being a statistician... or even a statistician's janitor for that matter, but let's take a look at something.  Gordon has won 58 races and four championships in nine seasons, that's an average of 6 wins per year and four championships every nine or ten years.  If Gordon, now 30, drives up until the time he's 50 and maintains this average, he could wind up with 120 career wins and 12 championships in a career spanning 30 years.  But let's be realistic...  Richard Petty drove for thirty four years and wasn't competitive for the last eight.  Darrell Waltrip drove for twenty eight years and was only competitive for twenty.  So, let's say that Jeff Gordon remains a solid competitor for twenty years at his current average... that's still about 120 wins and seven to eight championships.  Harry Gant proved in 1992 that age wasn't nessicarily a factor by winning four races in a row at the age of 52.  Bobby Allison won the Cup at the age of 46.  Dale Earnhardt remained competitive until his death at the age of 49 earlier this year.  Gordon will only be forty at the end of his next decade in racing.  In other words... (in case none of you have been able to follow my rambling here) all Gordon has to do is maintain the fire he's had this first decade to surpass David Pearson's 105 wins.  I can't see anybody ever beating Richard Petty's record of 200 wins unless NASCAR decides to start running sixty races per year.

Keep in mind that the above paragraph just pits the driver's numbers against one another.  There are other feats that drivers have performed that don't fit into cut and dried year by year numbers.  For instance, Dale Earnhardt, Tony Stewart, Davey Allison, Kevin Harvick and Matt Kenseth (if I've left anyone out here, I apologize.) all pulled off a win in their rookie year.  Jeff Gordon didn't do that.  It took Jeff Gordon two years to win a championship, where Dale Earnhardt won in 1980, his second season.  David Pearson, the driver the second most wins at 105, only won the championship three times, whereas Earnhardt, with 76 wins had seven championships.  So, as you can see, numbers alone are not the only measure of greatness.  

Jeff Gordon still has yet to break in to the top five of all time winners.  He needs 19 more wins to surpass Earnhardt's 76 career victories, 26 to pass Cale Yarborough at 83 wins, and 27 to overtake Darrell Waltrip's 84 wins.  Then finally, after 48 wins he will pass David Pearson.  

Gordon has also convinced me that race car drivers don't all come in the same wrapper.  Earnhardt was tough and aggressive, Richard Petty was determined and resolute,  Darrell Waltrip was animated and excitable, and Gordon?  It's hard for me to really typify him in the way I've just done, but I'd have to say that Gordon is quiet, smooth and professional.  If you had to classify his driving style, it could only be described as "always coming towards the front".

There's no denying that Jeff Gordon is a good driver and that he's here to stay.  Whether you worship him or hate him, there's no other way around it.  His words about Earnhardt after the NAPA 500 at Atlanta only further prove that Gordon is a true champion.  He admitted that he learned from Earnhardt by racing against him and thanked him for his contributions to the sport.  Gordon has an ingrained need to win and a willingness to learn, and that's a downright scary combination for any competitor.

You still won't catch me wearing a Jeff Gordon t-shirt, though.

Also new on TCGOB this week: "Yet Another Top Ten List" by Jan Bazen

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2001 Car Guy of Benchfield
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