Gordon

INDIANAPOLIS -- An effort to build team unity turned painful for Robby Gordon when he broke his left heel in a motocross bike accident.

Gordon was biking last week with the crew from his Richard Childress Racing team and was jumping hills when the bike landed incorrectly.

''I had the bike several feet in the air, cleared the first hill and tried to clear the second hill,'' Gordon said of the mishap last Saturday in Blakeslee, Pa. ''But the bike landed on top of the peak of the second hill.

''My ankles took the brunt of the impact because my feet were still on the pedals when the bike slammed down.''

Gordon's crew -- new because Childress swapped teams with Kevin Harvick in June -- carried him off the hill and straight to the doctor.

At first, it was thought he had only sprained both ankles, so he competed Sunday in the Pennsylvania 500 at Pocono Raceway wearing an air cast on his left foot and his right ankle taped for support. A second examination in North Carolina this week revealed the fractured heel,

He will compete in the Brickyard 400 on Sunday using an aluminum insert in his left shoe that team members made at Pocono to stabilize his left foot in the race car.

This will be Gordon's second trip to Indy this year. He competed in the Indianapolis 500 earlier this season, when he raced in that event and the Coca-Cola 600 on the same day.

But Gordon doesn't expect any advantage over the rest of the field just because he's been there already this year.

''I don't think I have an edge over anyone else because the Indy cars and Winston Cup cars are such different cars,'' he said. ''You can pretty much go wide open in an Indy car during qualifying but you can't do that in a Winston Cup car or you'll be wide open into the wall hard.''

No place like Indy
Ward Burton already has a victory in the most prestigious NASCAR race of the year. Now he wants one on the most famed track in auto racing.

Burton won the season-opening Daytona 500 and would like to cap his season with a win in the Brickyard 400 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway -- a track drivers think of as hallowed ground.

''The Daytona 500 is the only race on the NASCAR schedule that is more prestigious than the Brickyard 400,'' he said. ''There is no track we race at on the NASCAR circuit that even compares to Indy.''

Burton was a rookie in 1994 when he competed in the inaugural Brickyard 400 and still remembers the chills he got as he circled the track.

''I remember being completely overwhelmed when taking the pace laps around the track and seeing the sea of fans that were in the grandstands,'' he said. ''Not only was the number of fans there so spectacular, I also couldn't believe that a place that was known for Indy-car racing could be so enthused about watching a stock car race.''

In Furr good
Tony Furr had the interim tag removed from his name this week when car owner Ray Evernham chose him the permanent crew chief for Casey Atwood.

Since Furr began working with the team in May, Atwood's average finishing position has improved by eight to 23rd.

''We picked things up as soon as he got here,'' Atwood said. ''We got some good, top-20 finishes as soon as he came on. I think that he's the guy we need over here. He's had a lot of experience, and he knows how to win.

''When I tell him something's wrong with the car, he knows what I'm talking about. I think someone without as much experience really wouldn't know what to do to fix the car. A young driver like me needs someone with experience that he can rely on.''

Furr was at Hendrick Motorsports from 1998 until earlier this year, when he left in the shakeup on the No. 25 team for whom Jerry Nadeau drove.

More fines
Michael Kadlecik, crew chief for Tony Raines in the Busch Series, was fined $2,500 and suspended until Aug. 21 by NASCAR officials for ''improperly attached weight'' that came off Raines' car during a race last weekend.

Charles Lewis, crew chief for Ashton Lewis Jr., was fined $1,500 for use of a nonconforming front coil spring.

And in the Winston Cup series, Mike Beam, crew chief for Ricky Craven, was fined $2,500 because crew members ''entered the car servicing area without a helmet.''

Stat of the Week
Jeff Gordon is one of the most successful drivers in Indianapolis Motor Speedway history, with three wins, three poles and five top-five finishes in eight races on the famed track. A fourth victory would put Gordon in elite company -- he would join Al Unser, Rick Mears and A.J. Foyt as the only four-time winners in track history. The other three notched their wins in open-wheel cars, Gordon got his in stock cars.