NASCAR Cup

All-Star: Jeff Gordon preview

GORDON WANTS TO REVERSE HUMPY'S LUCK AND BE $1 MILLION SURVIVOR; PERFORMANCE ALLIANCE MAY BE KEY IN REWARD CHALLENGE CONCORD, N.C. - There is no voting off drivers in this Saturday night's NEXTEL All-Star Challenge at Lowe's Motor Speedway, but ...

Published: May 18, 2005, 11:55 PM

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GORDON WANTS TO REVERSE HUMPY'S LUCK AND BE $1 MILLION SURVIVOR; PERFORMANCE ALLIANCE MAY BE KEY IN REWARD CHALLENGE

CONCORD, N.C. - There is no voting off drivers in this Saturday night's NEXTEL All-Star Challenge at Lowe's Motor Speedway, but Jeff Gordon and Team DuPont hope that their own "Alliance" carries them to a million-dollar payday.

It is DuPont's Performance Alliance that has the familiar "fire and flames" paint scheme on the No. 24 car inverted for the only race on NASCAR's schedule that also inverts positions.

"It's only fitting that we run the DuPont Performance Alliance car in the All-Star event," said Gordon, who unofficially broke the track record during a test session here a few weeks ago. "The Performance Alliance represents a national network of DuPont's all-star collision repair shops, and hopefully we can carry them to Victory Lane in our All-Star event."

But unlike the popular television reality show "Survivor" which was taped long before its winner was revealed live on Sunday, NASCAR's survival challenge will be played out live in its entirety and is considered reality TV at its best by fans everywhere.

"I love this type of event because second place doesn't matter," said Gordon. "With no points on the line, it's all about winning."

If Gordon were to win NASCAR's All-Star event, he would become the first driver to score four victories in the annual event.

On Monday, Lowe's Motor Speedway President H.A. "Humpy" Wheeler predicted that the four-time Cup champion will win the "high stakes poker game" set for Saturday night. Wheeler revealed that Gordon was his "ace" for the event, yet Gordon does not know if that prediction is necessarily a good thing. Wheeler has correctly picked the winner in nine of 16 NEXTEL All-Star Challenge events, but has missed the mark with his last three predictions.

"It's pretty amazing how many times Humpy has picked the winner of this event," said Gordon. "But as many times as he has picked the winner correctly, I think he's only predicted one of my three wins.

"I guess his crystal ball has been a little foggy in recent years, but I hope it was clear on Monday when he made this prediction. We're going to do everything we can to prove him right and reverse his luck."

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