Year-by-Year Career

2000: In 2000, Jeff Gordon began to work with his second of three full-time crew chiefs. Robbie Loomis took on a lot of criticism early in the year, and Gordon only won 3 races. However, Gordon stood by Robbie and said that he believed that he had the best team in Nascar, they were just developing. He backed up his statement, finishing in the top-10 in 10 of the last 11 races of the year.

2001: Jeff Gordon won his 4th championship in 2001, with 6 victories, the most of any driver that year. It was his only championship with crew chief Robbie Loomis. He also won the first race held at Kansas Speedway and earned his first career win at Las Vegas. 2001 was also the first year Gordon started running the "flames" paint scheme.

2003: 2003 was almost a duplicate of 2002. Jeff Gordon had 3 wins, including a sweep of poles and wins at Martinsville, only the second time in the track's history, and finished 4th in points. 2003 was the last year of sponsorship from RJ Reynolds' Winston Cigarettes. They had special victory laps before each race for each person who won a cup championship between 1971-2003. Above is Jeff Gordon, who while racing the paint scheme qualified 2nd and finished 5th.

2004: The "Drive for Five" was alive for Jeff Gordon in 2004. He entered the chase for the championship leading the points. He went into the last race trailing by just 21 points. He finished 3rd in the last race. But he still fell 16 points short of the championship, and 8 points behind 2nd place Jimmie Johnson. Still, it was a very good year for Gordon. If not for the chase format, he would have been the season champion. He won 5 races and 6 poles, highlighted by his win at Indianapolis, the 4th win their in his career(above).

2005: 2005 was the first year that Gordon didn't finish in the top-ten in points since his rookie year. Gordon missed the chase, despite being an early favorite for the championship, with 3 wins in 9 races. His year was also highlighted by a win in the DAYTONA 500(above) and 4 wins in the season. He swept the races at Martinsville for the second time in 3 years. 2005 also brought an end to the Loomis-Gordon combo. Robbie Loomis, Gordon's crew chief, left Hendrick Motorsports to manage Petty Enterprises after Gordon missed the Chase. He was replaced by Steve Letarte, who earned his first win as crew chief in his 6th start.