WATKINS GLEN, N.Y. - Robby Gordon stretched his fuel over the final 39 laps to complete a sweep of this year's NASCAR road-course races with a victory Sunday at Watkins Glen International.
This time, nobody complained.
It's wasn't that way two months ago at the other road course in Sonoma, Calif., when Gordon won after violating the so-called gentlemen's agreement by passing teammate Kevin Harvick under caution.
Dawsonville's Bill Elliott started 25th and finished 20th. He finished 5th at Sonoma earlier in the year.
Gordon's only other victory two years ago at New Hampshire International Speedway also resulted in controversy. He took the lead near the end of the race by spinning out Jeff Gordon.
The key for Robby Gordon was pitting when Rusty Wallace went off the course on the 51st of 90 laps.
"I saw Rusty lock up the right front tire, and I called and said, `Rusty's in the sand,'" Gordon said.
Crew chief Kevin Hamlin reacted quickly.
"We heard the guy on the loudspeaker say, `trouble,' so we decided to dive in for gas," Hamlin said.
He called Gordon and said, "Pit now, pit now."
That move paid off when the field pitted under caution two laps later. That put him ahead of them, and Gordon took the lead when those still in front of him pitted on lap 61.
"Track position is so important," he said. "I don't know if we had the best car today, but we won. That's what teamwork is all about."
Jeff Gordon had the best car, but the worst luck. He started on the pole and was last after one lap because Greg Biffle spun him out on the first turn.
Then the four-time series champion spent the rest of the day trying to make it up. He reached third, but ran out of gas on the final turn and was knocked into the wall by Harvick.
"I was trying to get out of his way, but when you're out of gas you don't have too many options," said Gordon, who wound up 33rd.
Harvick was summoned to the NASCAR trailer for consultation, just as Biffle had been after hitting Gordon in anger last month in New Hampshire.
"If he was out of gas he should have gotten out of the groove," Harvick said of Gordon.
The rare sweep was the first in NASCAR since Jeff Gordon won both road-course events in 1998.
Robby Gordon's Chevrolet beat the Dodge of road-course ace Scott Pruett by 2.33 seconds to take the $4 million Sirius at The Glen. The winner led only once, for the final 30 laps.
It was the best career finish for Pruett, a former Winston Cup driver who has spent most of his career in sports car racing and the CART series. He also was trying to conserve fuel at the end, so there was no dramatic charge at the winner over the final laps.
"We had a strategy that we thought we could play," Pruett said. "It all depended on how many yellows we got, and they all worked out.
Dale Earnhardt Jr. finished third in a Chevy, followed by those of Jimmie Johnson and Harvick, the winner of last week's Brickyard 400.
Earnhardt looked like a winner for much of the race, but fell back to 20th after the final pit stop before charging through the field at the end.
"We had a great car," he said. "But I had to drive real hard to get up there and didn't have much left for the leaders."
The winner's average speed was 90.420 in race slowed for 14 laps by six caution flags. There were eight lead changes among eight drivers.
Ward Burton, Dale Jarrett, points leader Matt Kenseth, Ryan Newman and Mark Martin completed the top 10.
Kenseth leads Earnhardt by 258 points after 22 of 36 races.
Saturday
February 8th, 2025
5:06PM
