Notebook: Mears upset with Robby Gordon again

LAS VEGAS -- One of the earliest wrecks at Las Vegas Motor Speedway in Sunday's UAW-DaimlerChrysler 400 involved drivers Casey Mears and Robby Gordon.

Mears was none too pleased about it afterward.

"It amazes me," Mears said. "Every time I think Robby can't do anything any more stupid than he's already done, he one-ups himself.

"It's so early in the race. The tires are some of the hardest tires to drive we've had all year. It's such a long race and he puts us three-wide going into Turn 1. It's ridiculous. He's trying to pull something off in the first opening laps when it means nothing. I guess he's trying to be a hero, you know?"

Mears spent a good bit of the afternoon in the garage getting his No. 25 Chevrolet repaired, but he did eventually make it back onto the track to complete 141 of the race's 267 laps. He finished 40th.

Robby Gordon's No. 7 Ford escaped with much less damage and ended up completing 266 laps for a 17th-place finish.

Seeing red, or not

Dale Earnhardt Jr. salvaged an 11th-place finish that was by far his best of the season, and he had to overcome a late mistake to do it. On Lap 252, after a caution was thrown because Kasey Kahne hit the wall, Earnhardt inadvertently followed Jeff Burton onto pit road when it was closed.

Burton was having troubles with the battery in his No. 31 Chevrolet and had to come in anyway, so he expected to take a penalty that would send him to the back of the line for cars still on the lead lap. Earnhardt, running eighth at the time, could have stayed out and maintained better track position; instead, he came out 13th on the restart with just 11 laps to go in the race.

"I just followed the No. 31 in," Earnhardt said. "Pit road was closed and I didn't see, or wasn't looking. I didn't even think if it was closed or open. You're not thinking about that.

"We were going to stay out and then [crew chief] Tony [Eury] Jr. said to come in and I'm like, 'Yeah, I like going for it.' So I come on down pit road and No. 31 was coming and I was thinking he was on the lead lap with me and I forgot he had motor trouble or whatever. I'm thinking he's thinking what I'm thinking: let's get tires and try to win. But it was closed and we had to go to the back."

Leaving Las Vegas

Despite having considerable problems with the combination of the reconfigured track and a harder Goodyear tire at LVMS, Earnhardt probably spoke for everyone when he stated afterward: "I always like coming to Vegas. This track could be junk and I still like coming to Vegas. Vegas is a great town."

Struggles for Sadler

It was all Elliott Sadler could do to bring his No. 19 Dodge home in 14th place, even though he had qualified third and led 17 laps early.

"[Sunday] was frustrating," he said. "We had a great qualifying lap and great track position, but we just couldn't get a handle on the car. We were tight all day. ... We've just got to work better together on making changes during the race. We would make one adjustment and it would go one way, then make the same adjustment the next stop and it would go the other way.

"It's frustrating to lead laps in the first half of the race and spend the second half of the race struggling to finish 14th."

Pleasantly surprised

Mark Martin said that he expected Sunday's Cup race to be "disastrous, miserable." He was pleased when that turned out not to be the case.

"I expected it to be one of the most painful days on a racetrack that we've had. I think [Saturday] was. It just seemed to go a little bit better than that [Sunday]," Martin said.

"Of course all of the drivers did a fabulous job. They were very careful, very cautious, and it paid off."