Gordon’s Late Move a Winner at Richmond

Jeff Gordon passed Jeff Burton on the first lap of green-flag racing with 15 circuits to go Saturday night and pulled away to win the Chevrolet 400 at Richmond, Va., for his 52nd career victory.

Gordon, who stayed among the leaders but never led until he passed Burton on the outside in turns three and four at Richmond International Raceway, outran Dale Earnhardt to the finish.

During the post-race inspection, Gordon’s Chevrolet was found to have an irregular intake manifold. NASCAR impounded the manifold, but according to NASCAR spokesperson Danielle Humphrey, the results of the race will stand.

In other NASCAR news, restrictor plates will be required on cars next weekend when Winston Cup racing moves to Loudon, N.H., the track where Adam Petty and Kenny Irwin Jr. died two months apart after crashes earlier this year.

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Track safety continued to be an issue even as Helio Castroneves held onto the pole position for today’s Shell 300, the featured event of the Honda Grand Prix of Monterey.

Castroneves, Marlboro Team Penske teammate Gil de Ferran and Dario Franchitti remained in the top three positions despite failing to improve on their first-round qualifying laps at Laguna Seca Raceway.

Although there were no serious accidents, the track-safety issue continued to boil.

On the same track where rookie Gonzalo Rodriguez was killed last September while driving for the Penske team, Patrick Carpentier walked away without injury from a spectacular crash Friday.

Also at Laguna Seca, Casey Mears claimed his first career pole in qualifying for the Dayton Indy Lights Championship.

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Michael Schumacher and Rubens Barrichello clocked the two fastest qualifying times for today’s Italian Grand Prix at Monza.

Schumacher had to watch out more for his Ferrari teammate than for his traditional McLaren rivals as he clinched his 29th career pole position, the sixth this season.

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James Weston of Goleta pulled off the championship hat trick at Irwindale Speedway, winning the track and regional title, and the 50-lap NASCAR Late Model race before a crowd of 4,499.