Gordon aims to get back on track at Darlington

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CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- Jeff Gordon seems to be getting a bit testy these days.He's not alone.This season's stock car has been awkward to drive. And now teams are heading to Darlington, just repaved, with its stunning 200-mph speeds, and then to Lowe's Motor Speedway for a couple of weeks of work.Gordon was one of three drivers doing the Goodyear tire test at Darlington, along with Greg Biffle and Ryan Newman."They did a fantastic job with the repave," Gordon said. "The track is smooth and obviously very fast. Because it was a repave, it was very important for the three teams that went there to test to go back (for a second test) and make sure we were on the tire we are going to race and really get a good test on them. I thought we did."Still, I think it is going to be a little bit too fast this first race. But each race you are going to see the pace drop a little bit and the racing get better and better."Gordon can only hope for a good weekend; he's had so few lately.Before Saturday's Richmond race, Gordon and crew chief Steve Letarte were despondent about their chances. And for much of the night they were right. They had to start dead last because of an engine-starter issue. But they managed to finish ninth.Those pre-race worries sometimes pan out just as badly as expected, Gordon said, and then again sometimes things turn out much better."Sometimes it's like Vegas, where we came out and were fantastic; and sometimes it's like Texas, where we were right (in pre-race worries)," Gordon said."I don't believe we would have gone a lap down (at Richmond) if we hadn't had to start in the rear. That really killed us. Honestly the first 10 laps of the race I couldn't pass a single car."When you are that far back, it is almost impossible to make your way up through there. So actually the best thing that happened to us was that we went a lap down -- because then we got to go to the front (on the inside row, for the restarts)."When you are in the back of the field, I don't care what adjustments you make to the car, you aren't going to be able to fix it (because of bad track position). You aren't going to be able to really tell what the car is doing. By getting up to the front, we found out, 'Hey, we aren't that bad.'"I hung with the top five (still waiting for the yellow to get that lap back). Then we got our lap back."But Gordon had nothing for Denny Hamlin, Kyle Busch or Dale Earnhardt Jr.Gordon's thoughts on Hamlin stopping on the track late in Saturday's race, bringing out a caution that allowed teammate Busch a shot at the win, and taking away his own teammate's shot?"Just from an outsider looking in, it looked very obvious to me Denny was frustrated, overly frustrated -- he had just led 300-some laps and was pretty much going to win that race," Gordon said. "He was extremely upset and frustrated."Obviously he didn't do what most people would do -- which was come to pit road long before the tire blows. It was obvious when I went by him that he had a real issue."And what about that bump between Earnhardt and Busch?"I would say it was hard racing, that is what it looked to me like," Gordon said. "Everybody knows at Richmond when you are racing for the lead -- you can go back to me and Rusty Wallace -- the guy on the outside is going to race hard and make it very difficult for the guy on the inside to make the pass."... So it looked to me like Kyle drove in there just a little bit too hard, a little bit too close to Junior, and it just took the air off (Busch's car) and got him loose."Gordon apologizes for some of his bad language on the radio, saying, "I have been terrible on the radio this year."Why?"Because we have run like crap!" Gordon said. "If we are running up front, you don't hear a word out of me. If we are running terrible, then you are going to hear me."It goes back to frustration. It is just frustrating. I know what we are capable of doing, I know how good we can be. But this year we are so outside the box with what we are trying to do to make this (winged) car have down force and get grip out of it that it just drives really, really bad."The crazy thing is it seems like the worse we make the car drive, the faster it goes. But to drive 400 laps or 500 miles like that is not fun. I have apologized to Steve big time this year, because I can't help it. I get out there, I get frustrated."Nevertheless, Gordon said he's not losing confidence."Oh, no, no," Gordon said. "I have seen this so many times: People want to judge very quickly; and they listen to the radio and they think they know more about what is going on than we do."I love that fans are able to listen and really be inside of what is happening. But -- remember -- that is a small window of what is happening."They aren't at the shop; they aren't on the phone; they aren't behind the scenes in the trailer when we are having conversations."Steve has a tremendous amount of confidence, and he is one of the best crew chiefs I have ever had, he is one of the best crew chiefs in the garage."Now when we are running good -- like last year, everything was great -- nobody said a word about that. We just haven't been running good this year."Nobody has been pushing harder to get better than Steve."I am just thankful I have a crew chief like him who puts up with me when I am like that."(Contact Mike Mulhern at mmulhern(at)wsjournal.com.)(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, www.scrippsnews.com.)