Brian Vickers, left, and crew chief Lance McGrew won the Nextel Open and then placed third in the All-Star Challenge. Credit: Autostock

Hendrick hopes top-fives an omen for Coke 600

CONCORD, N.C. -- While Fords swept the top two spots Saturday night at Lowe's Motor Speedway, three Hendrick Motorsports cars quietly made up the rest of the top five in the Nextel All-Star Challenge.

That bodes ill for all those coming back here next weekend for the Coca-Cola 600 on Memorial Day weekend.

	Jimmie Johnson (48) and Jeff Gordon were two of three Hendrick cars to post top-five finishes. Credit: Autostock
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Brian Vickers, who raced his way into the All-Star race by winning the Nextel Open with a controversial last-lap punt of Mike Bliss, led the way in third, followed by Jeff Gordon in fourth and Jimmie Johnson in fifth.

Reactions, as expected, were very different once the engines were shut off and the drivers had time to think about their runs.

Vickers, as you might imagine, was upbeat. Johnson was sort of middle of the road, and Gordon was downright dour.

Asked what it would have taken to beat Mark Martin in the final 20-lap segment, Vickers was blunt. "It would have taken a longer race," he said. "We were tight going through the second segment and we lost a little bit of ground there.

"Going into the last segment, we wanted to make a more aggressive change than we did. We only changed air pressure because we couldn't afford to lose the track position.

"If we could have made a more aggressive change and got the car a little bit looser, we would really have had a shot at them [Martin and Elliott Sadler]."

Gordon was tight first, then after a track bar adjustment, the car bottomed out in the second segment. He changed two tires for the last segment and hung on for fourth.

"I wouldn't call it a great top-five," Gordon said. "We didn't give up on it, that's for sure. You know, I'm glad we came home with a top-five, but we were really way off.

"There were times when I thought we were really going to be good. The second run that we had was awesome, but I don't know, we just could never get back. When we were in traffic, it was really, really tight and we couldn't do much with them."

Gordon was right beside Ryan Newman, who had led 45 laps and was on his way back to the front on the second lap of the final segment, when Newman simply lost it in Turn 2 and hit the wall.

"I don't know what happened with Ryan, if he just got loose or somebody got into him," Gordon said. "I spun the tires off on that restart when we took two tires, so thank goodness there was a caution."

Johnson, who has owned Lowe's Motor Speedway the past couple of seasons, ran midpack the first two segments, finishing seventh in both before getting a solid restart and jumping into the top three for a time.

"We had a shot at it, but our car was real tight and on the pit stop we made some adjustments to try and make it better," Johnson said. "When I was lining up on the outside for the final restart, I knew I had a shot at it.

"I had about three or four laps when the tires were good to make a run at Mark, and I tried and it didn't work and the 38 [Sadler] got by me."

In 90 laps of racing in the All-Star itself, none of the three led a lap. Vickers led the last 200 feet of the Open after getting into Bliss.

Despite that fact, Johnson was upbeat about the night.

"The Hendrick group, with Brian and Jeff, we were racing our butts off with third, fourth and fifth," he said. "So it was a good night, all in all. We learned a lot, I learned a lot about the track myself and I think we'll be better for the 600."