Gordon

MARTINSVILLE, Va. -- Jeff Gordon is certain his Hendrick Motorsports team can contend for more Winston Cup championships.

Gordon, who won the last of his four titles in 2001, was in the thick of the championship race this season until a miserable stretch from mid-July to the end of August.

That nine-race stint, with only two finishes better than 19th, sent him tumbling from second, 165 points behind leader Matt Kenseth, to sixth, 407 points behind going into Sunday's Subway 500 at Martinsville Speedway.

"I can't put blame on any one person or point a finger at any one thing that has kept us from winning the championship,'' said Gordon, who was fourth in points in 2002. "I can tell you that we were second in June, so there's no reason to make a major change when you go into August and all of a sudden you're backing into the fence a couple weeks in a row.''

Gordon, who acknowledges his team may have made mistakes managing fuel, got his only win this season in the spring race on this track. He enters Sunday with five straight fifth-place finishes and a shot at catching second-place Kevin Harvick.

"We've been solid enough to win the championship,'' Gordon said. "Just because we're not winning five or six races is what's got people's attention.''

Moving on up
Kurt Busch won last year's fall race at Martinsville from 36th in the 43-car field -- the farthest back any winner has come from on the half-mile oval.

He won't have to work quite as hard on Sunday. Busch will start 13th.

His best start in six previous races at Martinsville was 20th in April 2002, and that was his only start better than 36th.

"I feel like we won the pole,'' he said. "We came and tested and didn't really show much promise for qualifying, but I think we were able to adapt to the track a little bit better due to our test.''

Countdown to Cup
Series leader Matt Kenseth goes into Sunday with a 267-point lead over Kevin Harvick and one of his best starting positions of the season.

Kenseth's Roush Racing Ford will be 14th for the start of the 500-lap event -- only the 10th time in 32 races this season he has been among the top 15 for the green flag.

"I feel good about where we're at,'' Kenseth said. "We just need to not make mistakes.''

Kenseth bounced back last week at Charlotte with an eighth-place finish -- his 23rd top 10 of the season. That came after his two worst finishes of the season -- 33rd and 36th -- chopped into what had been a 436-point lead over Harvick.

Until those two finishes, Kenseth's 22nd-place run at this track last spring was his worst showing of the season.

Chemistry shakeup
Mike Skinner will be out of work after driving the No. 01 MB2 Motorsports Pontiac for the final time Sunday.

Skinner will be replaced next week at Atlanta by Joe Nemechek, who will give up his seat in the No. 25 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet to rookie Brian Vickers.

"It's a shame that every time I get really good chemistry with a crew chief and a team, we seem to get the rug jerked out from under us,'' said Skinner, who will make his 11th start in the 01.

Skinner spent five years with Richard Childress Racing before moving to Morgan McClure Motorsports in 2002. He lost that ride after the first 14 races this season.

Miscellaneous
Bobby Labonte finished second at Martinsville in April and leads the Winston Cup series with three top-five finishes in the five short-track races in 2003. ... Rusty Wallace, starting seventh Sunday, leads all active drivers with six wins and 15 top-fives at Martinsville. ... Ryan Newman and Dale Earnhardt Jr. have led at least one lap in a series-high 21 of the 31 races before Sunday.