Saturday night under the lights at Phoenix, Nextel Cup points leader Jeff Gordon scored his first win of the 2007 season. The victory was also his first at the desert track (one of only three NASCAR tracks where he had yet to register a win), and tied him with the late Dale Earnhardt on the all-time victory list (with 76 wins). To commemorate the fact and to pay homage to Eranhardt, Gordon flew his famous “3″ flag on his victory lap.

 Gordon started the race on pole and looked strong all evening long, but he wasn’t the quickest car out there. Gordon was clearly oupaced by the Joe Gibb’s prepared cars of Tony Stewart and Denny Hamlin.  Hamlin lead early on and looked a potential winner until a penalty for speeding in the pit lane dropped him to 31st. Hamlin battled back to finish a strong third behind team mate Stewart.

Gordon and Stewart raced hard and close with both drivers making what seemed impossible moves at times, often threading their cars through gaps that didn’t seem to be wide enough.  Gordon was assited by a late caution thrown when he was already in the pits, he exited ahead of the pace car and worked his way back to the front as everyone else pitted under the resultant yellow flag.

 The Top 10 finishers were:

1. Jeff Gordon (Chevrolet)
2. Tony Stewart (Chevrolet)
3. Denny Hamlin (Chevrolet)
4. Jimmie Johnson (Chevrolet)
5. Matt Kenseth (Ford)
6. Jeff Green (Chevrolet)
7. Kyle Busch (Chevrolet)
8. Bobby Labonte (Dodge)
9. Johnny Sauter (Chevrolet)
10. Kevin Harvick (Chevrolet)

The IRL’s annual visit to the Twin-Rings facility in Motegi, Japan provided an opportunity for the Andretti-Green Team to show that the off-season talk about them returning to the front of the pack had substance. The AGR squad proved quick in qualifying with all four cars taking top 10 grid positions.

Once the race started for real, after a short delay after home-town hero Kosuke Matsuura had hit the wall at Turn One, Lap One, it looked like it might be another Penske / Ganassi battle. But Tony Kanaan had other ideas and made his way to the front where he swapped the lead with Gannasi’s Dan Wheldon for the majority of the race.

The real drama came with just 14 laps to go as all the lead pack started diving for the pits for a lat minute splash-and-go fuel stop. First to blink was Wheldon, then Helio Castroneves followed quickly by Kanaan. After Kanaan, Sam Hornish Jr. and Scott Dixon made their stops. But canny fuel management meant that Kanaan’s stop was the shortest and after all the stops cycled around he ended up in front. The AGR car managed to hold on ahead of the fast charging Wheldon to take the victory.

The Top 10 finishers were:

1. Tony Kanaan (Andretti-Green)
2. Dan Wheldon  (Ganassi)
3. Dario Franchitti (Andretti-Green)
4. Scott Dixon (Ganassi)
5. Sam Hornish Jr. (Penske)
6. Scott Sharp (Rahal-Letterman)
7. Helio Castroneves (Penske)
8. Jeff Simmons (Rahal-Letterman)
9. Tomas Scheckter (Vision)
10. Buddy Rice (Dreyer & Reinbold)

In Sunday’s NASCAR Nextel Cup race at the Texas Motor Speedway, veteran Jeff Burton proved the old adage that it’s not about how many laps you lead, it’s all about which lap you lead. In a race dominated by points leader Jeff Gordon and crowd favorite Dale Earnhardt Jr., the wily Burton only headed the field for one lap - but it was the most important one - the last one.

The dominant Gordon inexplicably ran high and tapped the wall just 23 laps from the end, while Earnhardt was rammed heavily from behind by Kyle Busch as he tried to avoid a spinning Tony Stewart. The frustrated Stewart had earlier been tipped into a spin by a hard charging Juan Montoya. This spin had also collected reigning champion Jimmie Johnson.

With all the star names suffering problems Matt Kenseth found himself leading with Burton closing fast. Burton timed his move perfectly and passed Kenseth with one to go to take the victory.

The Top 10 finishers were:

1. Jeff Burton (Chevrolet)
2. Matt Kenseth (Ford)
3. Mark Martin (Chevrolet)
4. Jeff Gordon (Chevrolet)
5. Jamie McMurray (Ford)
6. Greg Biffle (Ford)
7. Martin Truex Jr (Chevrolet)
8. Juan Montoya (Dodge)
9. Denny Hamlin (Chevrolet)
10. David Stremme (Dodge)

A third place podium finish in the A1GP feature race at Shanghai, China was sufficient for Germany to secure the 2006/2007 “World Cup of Motorsports.” The race victory went to New Zealand ahead of a hard charging Great Britain team. The series moves on to Brands Hatch in the UK for the season finale in a couple of weeks.

Triple ChampCar Champion Sebastian Bourdais put the bad experiences of the last race in Las Vegas behind him and returned to his usual dominant form at the Long Beach Grand Prix, registering his third consecutive victory at the California street race. Bourdais was never really challenged from the flag, and only headed when other drivers pitted out of sequence.

The major news of the weekend involved Bourdais’ arch-rival Paul Tracy. Tracy suffered a compression fracture in the small of his back after hitting the wall in Saturday’s practice session. The Canadian will be out for at least three months. His place on the Forsythe team was taken by Oriel Servia, who mysteriously is without a full time ChampCar seat this season. Servia qualified sixteenth after just a few installation laps and then proceeded to drive a brilliant race pulling himself through the field to finish second.

First round winner Will Power finished thrird to consolidate his position at the top of the points table.

The Top 10 finishers were:

1. Bourdais (Newman/ Haas/ Lanigan Racing)
2. Servia (Forsythe Championship Racing)
3. Power (Team Australia)
4. Wilson (RSPORTS)
5. Tagliani (RSPORTS)
6. Junqueira (Dale Coyne Racing)
7. Jani (PKV Racing)
8. Rahal (Newman/ Haas/ Lanigan Racing)
9. Dalziel (Pacific Coast Motorsports)
10. Legge (Dale Coyne Racing)