Jeff Gordon Wins Samsung 500

(Fort Worth, Texas) Jeff Gordon won the Samsung 500 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race at Texas Motor Speedway. It is Gordon’s first victory of the year, and his first at TMS. The win ends a career-long 47 race winless streak.

The victory is Gordon’s 82nd win, most among active drivers, sixth all-time.  Gordon now has a win at every active track but one – Homestead-Miami Speedway.  He increases his lead in the series point standings to 162 points over teammate Jimmie Johnson.

Texas has been a difficult track for Gordon, giving him his worst finish ever (43rd) last season.  He was asked about early in the weekend.  His answers were confident, foretelling what was to come:   “Even though we haven’t won here before I’m always optimistic because the team is working hard to make improvements and I’m working hard to do what I can to give them the best feedback that I can so that we can win here and be competitive enough.”

Gordon credited his pit crew for getting him out front with just under 30 laps to go.  He was able to hold his lead over a hard-charging Jimmie Johnson.  “On the run before that, we didn’t get any clean air there and I was really loose. So I thought if we tightened it up that maybe we could get out there and run away from them.  And so Steve Letarte and his team just did an amazing job on the pit stop getting us out first and making those adjustments and the car took off.”

Rounding out the top-five were Johnson, Greg Biffle, Tony Stewart, and Matt Kenseth.

Gordon takes home $541,874, the largest purse in Texas Motor Speedway history.