A spirited give and take becomes a lesson learned (cont'd)

After the race, Gordon was disappointed in his finish. Maybe he was a little frustrated to be fifth; but in his typical balanced way he presented a well-measured demeanor, especially when speaking of Montoya, who charged to third.

But again, perspectives ruled and ironically, if you swapped the faces of the speakers, or changed the names in the transcripts, either one could have been mistaken for the other.

"He's an aggressive driver," Gordon said. "We've seen it from him before. I thought I did something to make him mad because I didn't understand why he was just driving into me for no reason. But hey, that's Martinsville. That's kind of the way he drives."

And it's kind of the way perspectives work.

"It's OK," Montoya said. "I never really had a big problem with him, but he's always so hard to race against. But he probably says the same thing against me, because he never gave me any room -- why am I going to give him any? It's a vicious circle."

But one, through open communication, both men apparently tried to break.

"We're good -- I talked to him afterwards," Montoya said. "Right at the end we ran together and he gave me room and I gave him room -- I mean, you can do it. It's just you've got to be -- sometimes you've got to set a precedent so people back off a little."

"I just tried not to make him mad anymore and race him as clean as I could," Gordon said. "And unfortunately my car wasn't as good on the restarts and he got by me and we had a great battle for third and we raced clean at the end.

"That's all that really matters. I hope it's not something that transfers over because I don't know, really, what I did if I did do something."

Just maybe, one more conversation is in order -- though it might not occur until it's time to come back to Martinsville next spring. Considering Gordon and Montoya will be championship contenders next year, this hatchet might be one best well-buried.

Montoya has excelled at Martinsville since he came to the Cup Series, even as he sharpens his game everywhere the series races. And there's no question, given all the rough-and-tumble antics in his past, he has no qualms about swapping anything.

"When people are clean with you, you're going to be clean with them -- when they race the hell out of you, you're going to do the same," Montoya said. "That's what it is. But you're going to end up beating it, banging it and hitting it and getting hit. It's part of the deal. It's fun."

Even with a championship on the line.

Kyle Busch Victory Watch

Here's a question for everyone who thinks Kyle Busch is just too danged aggressive? If that's true -- and his talent behind the wheel is unquestioned -- then how does he seem to get outrun so much at the end of races when the win is on the line?

It happened again at Memphis, which as predicted was his best opportunity to try to eclipse his 2008 record total of 21 wins (8 Cup, 10 Nationwide, 3 Truck). And now, barring a miraculous return to the Cup Series by new crew chief Dave Rogers at Texas, Busch's hopes of doing it lie mostly in the Nationwide and Truck series.

Busch remains at 16 wins: 4 Cup, 7 Nationwide, 5 Truck. At this point last year he was at 20: 8 Cup, 9 Nationwide, 3 Truck; so given that I'm thinking he'll "run out" in all three series, with 12 races remaining to win six -- the order remains very tall. But if he can have better luck and chassis tuning, it's still very possible.

The opinions expressed are solely those of the writer.

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