NASCAR's annual trip to Sonoma, Calif., always has been a celebration for Jeff Gordon. Surrounded by family and friends, he enjoys some fine wine, a game or two of croquet and his many personal milestones.

Two years ago he threw an engagement party here, and last year he celebrated the birth of his first child. The party this trip is daughter Ella's first birthday, planned for after the garage closed yesterday at Infineon Raceway.

But if Gordon has it his way, the celebration will stretch to Victory Lane today with his first win of the year. He already had scored four of his six 2007 victories by this point a year ago, but this four-time Cup Series champion has struggled to duplicate those efforts this year.

He said he's "not yet" frustrated by this winless streak. Instead, his aggravation is directed at the ups and downs his Hendrick Motorsports team is experiencing.

"I'm more frustrated that we're not more competitive," Gordon said. "To me, you can be the fastest car out there and not get wins. So that's not really bothering me. What's bothering me is that we're hit or miss. We've put some top-fives together -- some of them we earned, some of them we earned by strategy.

"We didn't go out there and really perform well enough to get those and that's where I feel like we really want to be -- really getting the performance of our car."

Gordon was a model of consistency last season, racking up a NASCAR record 30 top-10 finishes in the 36 points races. He built a lead of more than 300 points on the competition during the "regular season," then staged an epic battle with teammate Jimmie Johnson for the championship before finally settling for second in what will go down as one of the greatest seasons of his career.

So why has his performance fallen so far off? He does have six top-fives through the first 15 races, but those finishes are pocked by days such as Pocono and Michigan, where he was an uncharacteristic 14th and 18th.

Gordon points to the full-time use of the Car of Tomorrow as one of the issues plaguing the No. 24 team. Hendrick Motorsports was better than every other team last season in managing the back-and-forth swapping of the new and old cars, and maybe this year other teams have simply caught up because there's only one car in which to focus.

"We weren't on mile-and-a-half tracks with this car. We had the old car and we had the old car dialed in. We had this car dialed in for the tracks we were going to. And it was really that we had it more dialed in than our competitors," Gordon said. "Our competitors went to work and they've gotten better. And we've got to step up."

IRL

IndyCar Series points leader Scott Dixon earned the pole today for the Iowa Corn Indy 250 in Newton, Iowa, because rain washed out qualifying. Helio Castroneves will join Dixon on the front row -- just as they were at Iowa a year ago.

Nationwide

Carl Edwards was desperate to get back into victory lane in the NASCAR Nationwide Series, and he wasn't about to let Clint Bowyer stand in his way at the Milwaukee Mile in West Allis, Wis. Edwards shoved his fellow Sprint Cup series standout sideways with 25 laps to go, then held off young lion Joey Logano for his first Nationwide victory of the season after dominating the series last year.

Formula One

Kimi Raikkonen led Ferrari 1-2 in qualifying for the French Grand Prix in Magny Cours. Raikkonen finished 0.041 seconds ahead of teammate Felipe Massa to give Ferrari its 200th pole and third 1-2 start of the season.

NHRA

Scott Kalitta of Palmetto, Fla., died yesterday when his Funny Car crashed and burst into flames in qualifying for the Lucas Oil NHRA SuperNationals in Englishtown, N.J. He was 46. Kalitta's Toyota Solara was traveling at an estimated speed of 300 mph when the crash occurred.