Coming into the weekend's race at Atlanta, Jeff Gordon had 63 victories, four championships and the kind of statistics to rival the best ever in NASCAR.

So you can understand why it's a little funny when he plays the "no respect" card.

But there he was Monday, after rain had washed out a Sunday race at Atlanta, sitting in victory lane and wondering why everybody was so quick to jump off the bandwagon before his 64th Winston Cup victory; wondering why everyone was so eager to doubt him.

"Never count us out," Gordon said. "I know we haven't won a whole lot this year, but we're strong finishers. I'm just so proud of this team and their efforts right now. We've had (six) straight great runs and we're going to keep it going."

In the past 10 years, Gordon has had it all. He's had amazing equipment and more than his fair share of luck. He's had the spotlight and his fans' devotion. He's had his competitors' number and a hatred from his competitors' fans that can stem only from being too good at what you do.

And, now, a decade into his career, he believes too many folks are ready to write him off. A couple of bad races, some poor luck and Jeff Gordon's stuck with another top-10 Winston Cup points finish with a handful of victories.

When Gordon is not in the Winston Cup points lead you know he's going to have to deal with the questions of what went wrong this year. But he's not focusing on what might have been. He's busy focusing on what is going on right now, which is a torrid pace he's setting for the rest of the field as he closes out the season.

"It's as strong as it's ever been," Gordon said of his No. 24 Chevrolet Monte Carlo team. "It cracks me up that just a month ago there were all these doubts and questions. And that was from outside, not from inside.

"Now, we're able to show really just how good it is and it feels great to do it the way we have here lately. This is all about not only trying to get as far up in the points as we can this year, but to build momentum for that off-season. How you do that is by having good runs and winning races. You go into the off-season, those guys are ... fired up.

"They have to build a lot of cars and they have a lot of work ahead of them. It can be a tough off-season if you end on a tough note or a bad note, that off-season can be rough. By ending on a good note, it can carry momentum through the winter."

	Gordon notched his third victory of the season with Monday's win at Atlanta.

Gordon has certainly got some momentum going right now. With his second straight victory, he's got three wins on the year and six straight top-five finishes. Three races remain and Gordon's competitors once again are reminded to check for the 24 lurking in their mirrors.

That's a feeling Gordon likes -- and one he has missed.

The last time he remembers causing a stir like this was when he closed out the 2000 season. Whenever Gordon fails to win a championship it prompts questions about a disappointing season. No doubt, these same inquiries will be presented this year. But Gordon said this final, bonsai run through the remainder of 2003 reminds of him of when he was getting those questions in 2000 despite running quite strongly.

Gordon said the solid finish in 2000 gave his crew the momentum going into the off-season to build super-fast race cars and he came out dusted the competition in 2001. Although he isn't ready to make predictions about 2004, he is finding hard to shake this familiar feeling.

That's why he's not concerned with what might have happened had his luck been a little different earlier in the summer. With a fast car and changing fortunes, the future's looking bright once more and Gordon is tuning up for another run next year.

"I just try to learn from (the misfortune) and move on and just focus on now and what's happening," he said. "We can certainly learn from those situations for next year, but it's just kind of the way our season has been. If it's meant to be, then it will fall right for you and right now it is. Things are going well for us and we're taking advantage of that and not looking back.

"That's what we're trying to do right now is build for next year," he said. "We did it in 2000, and that's why it reminds me of that. We really came into our own toward the end of that year, gained momentum and confidence with good race cars, a good pit crew and the chemistry of the team, really, communication between Robbie (crew chief Robbie Loomis) and myself and that's what we have right now."

Basically, they have the makings for yet another serious run.

"We fight for a lot of things," Gordon said. "Number one is, we always want to win and we fight to win every race. We've had to fight extra hard here because of all the downfalls we had during the summer. Throughout that time, I never thought we weren't performing at a high enough level, never felt like there was any one thing that was preventing us from finishing races or winning races. They were just circumstances that were happening.

"(But) the thing I love about our race team is when we go through tough times, and we've been through them not just this year but in other years, it just makes us dig deeper and get stronger. This reminds us a little bit of 2000, where we ended the season on a real positive note, and this is better because I don't remember us winning a couple of races toward the end of the (2000) season. We're very excited about the way things are right now."

Gordon is fifth in the points race now, within striking distance of his the tight, three-man battle for second that his teammate Jimmie Johnson is waging with Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Kevin Harvick. Gordon said he wasn't content in simply finishing the year out strong and letting the team end up wherever it does in the points standings. Only three races remain and Matt Kenseth has not loosened the bear grip he's had on the Winston Cup trophy since the beginning of the season. But Gordon and Co. are still fighting.

"Our main focus has been second in the points," he said. "We've made big gains toward that, and I guess if there is a miracle, there's still a possibility. We just want to keep doing what we're doing right now, and that's putting great race cars out there, communicating well and fighting until the end. When I have pit stops like we had today and a race car like that, we're going to do some spectacular things. I think we have some more left in us before it's all over this year."

Rupen Fofaria is a freelance writer living in Chicago and a regular contributor to ESPN.com. He can be reached at rfofaria@espnspecial.com.