Jeff Gordon shows his angry side at Kenseth and NASCAR after Martinsville

Jeff Gordon was less than a 100 feet from victory Monday at Martinsville.

Gordon looked to be in position early in the Goody’s 500 to win his first race of the season. He led 4 times for 92 laps with most of those coming in the first half of the rescheduled race. But after lap 139 Gordon began to fade.

“We had an awesome car all weekend. I was very happy with it,” Gordon said. “When they dropped the green, there was no surprise to me how good we were. But, the track conditions changed on us and we lost some track position. When we lost that track position, we played catch up the rest of the day.”

Gordon did eventually catch up and with just over 50 laps to go had battled his way back into the top five. He found himself in third when the 12th of 13 cautions came out with only eight laps to go. Surprisingly both cars ahead of him, the Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota’s of Denny Hamlin and Kyle Busch, dove into the pits while Gordon and those behind him elected to stay out.

“We were just kind of riding there at the end, going to come home third, then that caution came out, leaders came in,” Gordon said. “(Crew chief) Steve Letarte made a great call to stay out. When we heard about all the cars that stayed out behind us, we felt we were definitely the car to beat for the win. “

Gordon led the field to the green on lap 498 and looked to be pulling ahead. Behind him though, as Hamlin and Busch tried to work their way back to the front, Busch was spun hard into the wall. Gordon was coming out of turn 4 when the incident happened and instead of being greeted with a white flag, the caution flew setting up a green white checkered flag finish.

Then on the subsequent restart, all hopes of a win by Gordon quickly evaporated.

As Gordon entered turns 1 and 2, he was tapped by Matt Kenseth. Gordon was able to hold his position while Hamlin who had restarted fourth, stuck the nose of his Toyota under Gordon and Kenseth. As the trio entered turn 3, Kenseth entered the corner too fast forcing Gordon up the track and allowing Hamlin and fellow Gibbs racer Joey Logano to slip by. Hamlin would go on to win, Logano would finish second. Gordon settled for third but not before he gave Kenseth’s Ford a little shove towards the outside wall that according to Gordon ensured one thing.

“I saw the No. 17 (Kenseth) was way behind me,” Gordon said about the final restart. “I drove into (Turn) 1, trying to not overcook it and he drove into the back of me so hard that I don't know what happened; if the No. 11 (Hamlin) got in the back of him or if he just drove into the back of me, but I made sure he wasn't going to win the race after that."

Kenseth finished 18th.

“I did go in there and I did get into Jeff a little bit, really not that hard, and I got under him and everything was fine and he just took a left as hard as he could take one and ran me down all the way into the marbles,” Kenseth said. “I’ve got all the marbles on my rear tires and I slowed up to try to get in the corner real slow and I kind of got hit from behind and I got hit in the side and started wheel-hopping. I couldn’t hang onto it when I got to three. It’s nothing Jeff wouldn’t have done or hasn’t done to me, expect he’s wrecked me all the way out, so it was just an aggressive race for the end.”

Another part of Gordon’s frustration according to him was his perception that perhaps NASCAR had intentionally orchestrated the end of the race.

“It was pretty obvious to me NASCAR wanted to do a green white checkered finish,” Gordon said. ” There were cars blowing tires, hitting the wall, they weren't throwing the caution. One spins out, and they threw the caution in the blink of an eye. I think it was pretty obvious what they wanted.”

“You got to go with what their decisions are. It's a Monday race,” he added. “A lot of fans came out here. So certainly a great finish for them. Just unfortunate it took away an opportunity for us because we definitely had that win had the caution not come out there at the end.”

On the final caution, the Toyota of Kyle Busch did slam the wall hard causing major damage and scattering debris on the track. There were several incidents earlier in the race such as when Marcos Ambrose spun but made no contact and was able to rejoin the race; NASCAR did not elect to throw a caution on that occasion.

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