Gordon Steams to Seventh Darlington Victory
Jeff Gordon overcame a heating problem as the race came to a close and held off a hard charging Denny Hamlin to win the rain-delayed Dodge Avenger 500 at Darlington Raceway to net his 78th victory in 484 career NASCAR NEXTEL Cup Series races.
This is Gordon's third victory and 10th top-10 finish in 2007. With steam shooting out of the hood of his car like an old locomotive, Gordon railroaded his way to his seventh victory and 18th top-10 finish in 27 races at Darlington Raceway.
Denny Hamlin finished second, .978 second behind the DuPont Chevrolet. It is his sixth top-10 of 2007
and his second in as many races at Darlington.
Jimmie Johnson finished third, posting his eight 2007 top-10 and his seventh in eight races at Darlington.
Hendrick Motorsports has won four consecutive races (Phoenix-Darlington). Gordon accounted for three of those
victories with Johnson posting the other. This is the second time this season and the fourth time since 1998 that
HMS has posted four straight wins.
Gordon retained the point lead for the seventh race and is now 231 points ahead of Johnson.
Bowyer Captures Career First Pole Position
Clint Bowyer won the Bud Pole for the Dodge Avenger 500, his first career Bud Pole 48 NASCAR
NEXTEL Cup races.
Bowyer posted a lap of 29.806 seconds at 164.987 mph.
This is his third top-10 start in 2007.
This is Bowyer’s second top-10 start in two races at Darlington. He started third here last season.
Greg Biffle (second) posted a lap of 29.826 seconds at 164.876 mph. This is his fifth top-10 start in
six races at Darlington. He has started third twice and ninth twice in his previous top-10 starts. Biffle
has won the past two NASCAR NEXTEL Cup races at Darlington.
Jamie McMurray (third) posted his fourth top-10 start of 2007. All of his top-10 have also been topfives
and have come in Car-of-Tomorrow races.
David Reutimann (14th) was the fastest qualifying rookie.
Ken Schrader (eighth) was the fastest of the cars that had to make the field on time. This is his
second top-10 start in 2007.
