Gordon

It's about time. The No. 31 Cingular Wireless team took advantage of our strength on road courses and scored our first top-five finish of the season Sunday at Watkins Glen International. We have run in the top-five many times this year, but never could stay there when it counted. The official count stands at four top-10s in the last five races and we're hoping to add another top-five or a victory this weekend at Michigan.

Watkins Glen was good to us from the minute we rolled the Cingular Wireless Chevrolet off the truck Friday morning. We were the second-fastest car in Friday's practice, but decided to play it a bit conservative in qualifying that afternoon. I'd rather start a little farther back in the field than risk running off the course while trying to bust off a great lap in qualifying. Despite that strategy, we landed the seventh starting spot and knew we wouldn't have much trouble passing the cars in front of us on the way to the lead. We were right.

We charged to the front from the moment NFL Hall of Fame quarterback Jim Kelly waved the green flag Sunday to start the race. The Cingular Wireless Chevrolet gained two positions by the time we reached the first turn and was in second by the end of the first lap. We were leading the 90-lap race by lap 3. The Cingular car was easily the fastest car on the track, but I kept getting behind other guys who were really slow and held me up for a while. Just like last year, we started checking out on the field and had a 2.2-second lead by lap seven and led through lap 24 before the time came for the first pit stop of the afternoon.

I should have known that things were looking too good to be true. We had a hang-up on the pit stop that dropped us to ninth. To try to make up some track position, we stayed out during the second caution flag and moved back up to second on lap 37.

We continued to chase right behind the leader when the third caution came out on lap 51, but once again we had problems in the pits. That is so unlike this crew. Those guys are usually on top of their game. But everyone has an off-day every so often. We fell to 13th, but patiently worked our way back up to third by lap 83, although passing was very difficult. You've got to take every opportunity on a road course to pass because they don't come too often.

NASCAR threw the red flag on lap 88 to allow time to clean up the track and end the race under the green flag. When they were ready to go, we were given the white flag along with the green flag for a one-lap shootout to the checkered flag. Tony Stewart had been getting a really "good" restart all day and we kind of thought he would do the same thing again. But I wasn't ready for him to take off like he did in Turn 10 -- I guess we got snookered a bit, although it didn't really look too legitimate to me. He seemed to accelerate before the restart marker on the track, but NASCAR didn't call it and we couldn't ever catch up to him and had to settle for third. But Tony drove a great race and my hat's off to him.

We were obviously thinking that Watkins Glen would be one of our best chances to get a win this year, but it will come soon. If you knock on the door long enough, it will open.

Next stop: Michigan
Maybe the Cingular Wireless team can surprise everyone and kick down that door this weekend at Michigan International Speedway. We struggled like crazy at Michigan in June, but we knew exactly what the problem was with the setup and we've since changed a few things. Some drivers can't drive with certain things under their car and I don't do well with rubber bushings like we used at Michigan. Kevin Hamlin and his guys didn't know me all that well at that point and we were still learning about each other. We went to Michigan last week and tested for this race so we're looking forward to a good weekend for the Cingular team.

We're taking the same car I finished eighth with in the Brickyard 400 two weeks ago at Indy. It was a great car and hopefully a lot of those characteristics will show up at Michigan. NASCAR changed the rules for the Chevrolets on the front-air dam for Michigan to allow for more front downforce on our cars. We create so much more drag than the other manufacturers and lack in front downforce. But it's going to take a while before we see a big change in it. If a team hits on something the first couple of races, they will be lucky. We didn't test with the new rules so we assume we'll be even better during the race than we were at the test.

I don't have a lot of experience at Michigan in a Winston Cup car, but when you start getting some track time at a certain speedway, you begin to learn what lines you can run. Michigan has a few different lines and not everyone runs the same line. The line we run this weekend will depend on what the car is capable of doing. That will give us a car that can set up and pass other cars, or drive deep into the corner when needed, or back off the gas early and get down to the bottom of the track to pass the other guys. There are many opportunities to pass at Michigan, but you've got to have the car capable of doing it or you just play 'follow-the-leader' for 400 miles.

	Robby Gordon is currently 21st in Cup points.

Horsepower is going to be very important at Michigan. Knock on wood, but the Cingular team hasn't had any engine problems yet this year, while other teams have lost motors -- and lots of them. You've got to have enough "oomph" in the motor to get you off those corners, but at the same time, you don't want to kill the motor and end up having to change it before the weekend ends, or worse, blow the motor during the race and end up with a bad finish. I'm very confident in Spenny Clendenen and Danny Lawrence and all the guys in the RCR engine department because they've done a heckuva job this year and haven't let me down at all.

Things have really come together the past few weeks for the Cingular team. We've scored four top-10s in the last five races and got our first top-five Sunday at Watkins Glen. I don't know if anyone outside RCR ever thought the Cingular Wireless and the GM Goodwrench Service teams would be racking up good finishes like we have the past few races since the crew swap. There were definitely a lot of naysayers out there who wrote off both teams. They tried to bury RCR as a 'has-been.' It's just too bad we couldn't be just getting the season started at this point because we'd be contending for a top-10 finish in the points along with Kevin Harvick.

Growing pains are difficult things to learn to deal with, but I think Richard Childress has everything under control. Richard is the man. Things are going smoothly in the new building. We've all learned a lot this season and learned to work with a lot of different people. The crews have learned to work under one roof as one team with three different cars and drivers.

And I've learned how to be a better driver. Kevin and Richard have been extremely patient with me, coaching me along and giving me pointers. I didn't have a lot of experience in Cup cars when this year started out and it's been great for me to go back to the same tracks for the second time this season that I hadn't been to many times before. Experience can only make you better and the Cingular team is seeing that first-hand. You can't say enough for experience, but man, we're itching to go to Victory Lane. I know we'll get there. In the meantime, we're just happy to be gaining valuable points each weekend and creeping our way back into the top-20.

Robby Gordon drives the No. 31 Cingular Wireless Chevrolet for Richard Childress Racing. He will be providing a diary to ESPN.com throughout the Winston Cup season.