Currently serving as the Vice Chairman at Hendrick Motorsports, many younger fans of the sport might not recognize Jeff Gordon as the person to kick off NASCAR’s history of racing at one of the biggest sporting venues in the world – Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Long associated with the open-wheeled genre of IndyCar blazing around the quad-oval, stock car racing’s first foray onto the facility came in 1994.
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Driving the iconic #24 DuPont Chevrolet for Hendrick Motorsports at the time, Gordon went on to clinch victory during the event’s inaugural running, setting him off to his subsequent back-to-back championship run.
Jeff Gordon won the most Brickyard 400 (1994, 1998, 2001, 2004, and 2014) in Indianapolis, IN. #racing #streetwear #hypebeast #indianapolismotorspeedway #brickyard400 pic.twitter.com/HMKVSzeVsw
— Streetly Design Co. (@streetlyworld) January 8, 2021
Reflecting on the allure of winning at a venue as highly regarded as Indianapolis during NASCAR’s heyday in terms of viewership, the now 52-year-old looks back on how life as a driver changes after kissing the yard of bricks.
“My life’s never been the same since.” -Gordon told Racing America
The 4-time Cup Series champion touched on how the win catapulted him in the eyes of motorsports fans in the country. He recalled, “After that, it was just a whirlwind. Your face up on billboards and in magazines and your autograph lines got bigger and the applause got louder. It really just launched what we could’ve never imagined the next few years to be.”
After winning the inaugural Cup race at Indy, the California native went on to win consecutive championship titles.
Gordon looks back at his final victory at the Brickyard
The former #24 Chevrolet driver at Rick Hendrick’s racing outfit, Jeff Gordon went on to clinch another stat that stands to this day in the sport. Gordon remains the winningest driver at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway with five NASCAR wins at the venue to his name, the final one of which came in 2014.
The now 52-year-old looked back at his final hurrah at the famed venue as well as his 2014 season as a whole and recalled, “We were just super competitive. The whole team was just clicking. We had fast racecars every weekend and we really should have been competing for the championship that year but came up short but that Brickyard really capped off an amazing season.”
As the sport heads back to the hallowed 2.5-mile-long venue, Jeff Gordon and NASCAR fans will be looking forward to what has been one of American stock car racing’s crown jewel events. Despite the venue featured on the calendar previously with its road course layout, something about the quad-oval and the heritage of the facility brings out an extra in drivers and teams competing. It remains to be seen who can grab a chance to kiss the yard of bricks this Sunday.
