INSIDE MOTOR SPORTS
Down to the Wire
Why Jarrett thinks Gordon might choke
by Ed Hinton
Posted: Wed November 12, 1997
Despite trailing in the driver standings by 77 points, Dale
Jarrett isn't nearly the long shot to overtake Jeff Gordon and
win the Winston Cup championship that the deficit suggests.
Going into Sunday's season-ending NAPA 500 at Atlanta Motor
Speedway, the momentum and confidence that Jarrett and his team
gained in the last few weeks have turned an apparent runaway by
Gordon into a sprint for the title.
 If Gordon, 26, finishes 18th or better at Atlanta, he will
clinch his second championship in three years. "I wish it was as
easy as it sounds," says Gordon, whose 17th-place finish in the
Dura-Lube 500K at Phoenix on Nov. 2 left the door open for his
closest challengers. Even if Gordon places as low as 29th,
Jarrett still needs a top five finish to earn enough points to
win his first championship. He may do that, considering how he
overpowered the field at Phoenix, roaring back from nearly a
full lap down to win and pare his deficit by 67 points. Jarrett
says he's "not cocky, just confident" that he'll win at Atlanta
too.
"I would equate the situation with the 1996 Masters," says
Jarrett, 40, a scratch golfer who turned down a college golf
scholarship to race. "Going into the final round, Nick Faldo was
six shots behind Greg Norman. But Faldo did come from behind. In
tournaments I played, I always found it was a lot more difficult
to protect a lead than to come from behind. We're going to
Atlanta thinking of nothing but leading laps and winning the
race. Jeff and his team are trying to make sure they don't make
a mistake."
Jarrett's golf analogy is an apt one when you consider Gordon's
Normanesque tendency to falter down the stretch. In '95 Gordon
led Dale Earnhardt by 302 points with four races left; he won
the championship by just 34 points. Last year he lost to Terry
Labonte's steady charge over the last six races.
Jarrett won the Primestar 500 at Atlanta in March, and though
the track has since been reconfigured to include a dogleg in the
front stretch, he also ran well there in October testing.
Jarrett plans to drive the same Thunderbird in which he won last
month's UAW-GM Quality 500 at Atlanta's sister track, Charlotte
Motor Speedway.
It's mathematically possible that Mark Martin, who trails Gordon
by 87 points in the standings, could catch him and Jarrett at
Atlanta. But even if Martin were to win the race and lead the
most laps, he would need Gordon to finish lower than 23rd and
Jarrett lower than third.
"We're not the ones with the guns pointed at our heads,"
Jarrett's crew chief, Todd Parrott, says of Gordon's team.
"We're the ones pointing the guns." But don't discount Gordon's
ability to dodge bullets. After his Monte Carlo blew a tire at
Phoenix, dropping him to 30th place, he made up 13 positions
over the last 38 laps in what might have been the gutsiest
nonwinning performance of his career. Gordon salvaged 39
precious points, which could turn out to decide the driving
championship.
The Number
15
The number of makes of automobile that have won Grand
National/Winston Cup races since NASCAR was founded in 1948.
More than 25 makes have started races, including Tuckers,
Willyses, Aston Martins, Porsches and Volkswagens. A Jaguar is
the only foreign-built car to have won a race.
Issue date: November 17, 1997
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