Gordon Hits, Hits, Hits, Then Wins in Detroit

On Friday, Robby Gordon crashed in practice, then led the opening round of qualifying for the Detroit Grand Prix.

On Saturday, he hit the wall again, but held onto the pole position.

On Sunday, he hit the wall in the warmup, damaging his Ford-powered Reynard Indy car. Then he led from Lap 43, holding off Jimmy Vasser to the end of the 77-lap race on Belle Isle’s 2.1-mile, 14-turn street course to win.

“Sometimes we wondered why we were here because every time we went out something went wrong,” car owner Derrick Walker said.

Gordon led the first eight laps, dropped back to fifth, changed tires and worked his way back.

Vasser stayed within a second of the lead on the late laps, finishing 0.34 seconds behind Gordon.

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Jean Alesi, taking control after defending champion Michael Schumacher got stuck in third gear with 12 laps to go, won the Canadian Grand Prix in Montreal for his first Formula One victory in 91 tries.

Alesi averaged 106.747 m.p.h. for the 69 laps over the 2.75-mile Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, beating Rubens Barrichello’s Jordan-Peugeot by 31.687 seconds in a Ferrari.

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Jeff Gordon missed a shift on a restart with six laps remaining, damaging his engine and allowing Chevrolet teammate Terry Labonte to win the UAW-GM 500 at Pocono International Raceway.

Gordon led 124 of 200 laps, but finished 16th in the NASCAR Winston Cup event. Labonte led Ted Musgrave’s Ford by 1.64 seconds at the finish, averaging 138.719 m.p.h.

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Michael Doohan won the Italian Grand Prix motorcycle race, riding a Honda an average of 102.350 m.p.h. at the 3 1/4-mile Mugello circuit. . . . The finals of the Oldsmobile Springnationals National Hot Rod Assn. event at Kirkersville, Ohio, were postponed until today because of rain.