FORT WORTH, Texas -- Jeff Gordon is feeling confident.
Last season at Texas Motor Speedway, he took home a runner-up finish in April and was well on his way to another top-five result in November before a late-race incident knocked him back to 29th.
And this year's first race at the Fort Worth, Texas, track will begin with Gordon in 12th.
“It just gives me confidence that we were strong here last year and that we ran so well that we had cars that were capable of winning here and that gives you confidence when you go back," he said. "Even though we haven’t always had the great results here at Texas the last couple of years, I've always enjoyed coming here and feeling like no matter what the rules are, we’ve got a car and a team that perform really well here.”
The driver of the No. 24 Panasonic Chevrolet SS acknowledged that his 12th-place starting position was better than he expected when Friday's practice sessions began.
But after making the final round of qualifying and realizing how much speed the car will bring to the track, he's ready for a wild ride in tonight's race.
“I like to relate this track to a roller coaster because certainly driving it is similar to a roller coaster," he said. "The transitions from the straightaway to the corners are more abrupt than at any other track we go to."
Gordon explained that the pace of the race "goes up and down" as teams take new tires to increase the grip level -- and then those tires fall off "a lot" and drivers have to move all around the track.
"As you’re running the race here, you’re going to see a lot of cars that are going forward and going backwards and sort of up and down that way as well," he said. "It is definitely a roller-coaster ride."
And Gordon hopes to tame that ride to earn his second trip to Victory Lane at Texas Motor Speedway, a track where he has nine top-five finishes and 12 top-10s.
"I feel like we’ve been very strong here," Gordon said. "But we haven’t always had the, I don’t like to say ‘luck’ because I think you make your own luck, but I think that we haven’t had as good as results as I feel like we’ve performed here over the years. But it is nice to have that win and to run good and come in here with confidence that we can back that up again.”