Jeff Gordon breezes to victory in Auto Club 500

It was his second straight win and fifth straight top 10 finish.
FONTANA, Calif. (AP) -- Jeff Gordon has been around NASCAR long enough to know you've got to push your way through bad luck.
"Everybody was pretty down after we crashed in Darlington," Gordon said Sunday after winning the Auto Club 500 at California Speedway. "I kept telling everyone on our team to remember how many races we've got left and how good this team really is."
Since finishing 41st at Darlington on March 21, Gordon's No. 24 Chevrolet has steadily gained momentum.
"A couple of weeks ago, everybody was down on us," crew chief Robbie Loomis said.
"Jeff Gordon pushed me to believe in our team. We always support each other in difficult times."
Climbs to third in points
The victory was Gordon's second in two weeks and his fifth consecutive top-10 finish.
He was 160 points behind then-series leader Matt Kenseth after the bad day at Darlington, but now finds himself third, just 27 points behind Dale Earnhardt Jr., who finished 19th Sunday, and two behind teammate Jimmie Johnson.
"I think when you've got a team like this and a car like this and the resources we have at Hendrick Motorsports, well, we've got momentum right now," Gordon said.
"We weren't the best car at practice, but these guys really got it dialed in. It's been amazing the last few weeks."
With his three wins, Gordon is the only Nextel Cup driver with more than one victory on the 2-mile oval since NASCAR began racing at the track 60 miles east of Los Angeles in 1997.
"I've been hearing that a lot this week, how dominant I've been here, the laps that we've led and the races we've won," Gordon said. "All I can think of is the last three or four years, we've stunk."
It hasn't really been that bad -- except by the standards of a four-time series champion who has 66 victories.
Gordon finished 11th and 16th here the last two years, second in 2001 and 11th in 2000 after winning two of his first three starts and finishing fourth in the other.
"When they dropped the green flag, this car just ran straight to the front," Gordon said.
"Randy Dorton in the engine department, thank you, thank you. This was the baddest engine we've ever had under the hood."
Labonte runs out of gas
Bobby Labonte moved into second place on the 222nd of the 250 laps and was cutting steadily into Gordon's lead until he ran out of gas on the final lap. Labonte, who moved within about 10 car lengths of Gordon, coasted to the end, finishing fifth.
"I'm sure we didn't miscalculate, we just came up a little bit short after that last run," Labonte said. "With that second place that we had going there, it's hard to complain too much."
Labonte was not the only driver who got caught trying to stretch his final tank of gas to the end.
Johnson, who started the last lap in fifth, passed Labonte and wound up second when both Evernham Motorsports teammates Jeremy Mayfield and rookie Kasey Kahne had to pit for fuel.
Gordon led five times for a race-high 81 laps -- four more than Kahne -- taking the lead for the final time with 47 laps remaining during a series of green-flag pit stops.
Winning margin
Gordon beat Johnson across the finish line by 12.871 seconds -- nearly a third of lap. It was the 15th time Gordon has won at least two straight races.
Ryan Newman finished third, followed by Matt Kenseth, Labonte and rookie Brendan Gaughan, whose previous best finish was 13th at Talladega.
Kahne, who had run in the top five all afternoon, wound up 13th, the last driver on the lead lap, while Mayfield finished 14th after their late gas stops.
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