GEARING UP

What’s new in motor sports heading into this weekend:

1) The Jeff and Jimmie show that is NASCAR’s Chase for the Nextel Cup playoff might change a bit Sunday when the series heads to Texas Motor Speedway for the Dickies 500.

Jeff Gordon has a nine-point edge over Hendrick Motorsports teammate Jimmie Johnson, and both are comfortably leading the other 10 drivers in the Chase.

But neither driver has won a Cup race at Texas since the 1.5-mile track joined the series in 1997. Third-place Clint Bowyer, 111 points behind Gordon, hasn’t won a Cup race there, either.

2) The Tecate SCORE Baja 1000, considered by many the granddaddy of off-road races, is scheduled Nov. 11-16 through Mexico’s Baja California peninsula.

Nearly 450 vehicles from 41 states and 15 countries are expected to enter the 40th running of the race, which starts in Ensenada and ends in Cabo San Lucas.

3) Fortune Market Media Inc. said it acquired Sigalsport BMW, a Los Angeles-based team in the Daytona Prototype division of the Grand-Am Rolex Sports Car Series. Terms were not disclosed.

The team was renamed Fortune Market Racing and its former owner, Gene Sigal, will continue as a driver and director of the team.

4) An exhibit of racing-related paintings by Los Angeles artist Ingrid Calame, on display at the Indianapolis Museum of Art, includes one showing the victory “doughnuts,” or tire spins, made on the track by Dan Wheldon after he won the Indianapolis 500 in 2005.

After viewing the painting, Wheldon recalled that he was so emotional after winning he was in tears. “I thought, ‘I cannot drive into Victory Lane crying. I’m a man.’ So I started doing the doughnuts,” he said.

5) Sprint cars are featured tonight and Saturday night at Perris Auto Speedway. In other local racing Saturday night, Irwindale Speedway’s program includes a figure-eight race and Orange Show Speedway in San Bernardino has late-model stock cars.

THE CHASE

Nextel Cup standings through 33 of 36 races:

*--* Driver Points Behind 1. Jeff Gordon 6,201 -- 2. Jimmie Johnson 6,192 -9 3. Clint Bowyer 6,090 -111 4. Carl Edwards 5,940 -261 5. Tony Stewart 5,879 -322 6. Kyle Busch 5,873 -328 7. Kevin Harvick 5,809 -392 8. Jeff Burton 5,801 -400 9. Kurt Busch 5,782 -419 10. Denny Hamlin 5,777 -424 *--*

REMAINING RACES

* Sunday: Dickies 500, Fort Worth

* Nov. 11: Checker Auto Parts 500, Avondale, Ariz.

* Nov. 18: Ford 400, Homestead, Fla.

Associated Press

LIFE IN THE FASTLANE

Dale Earnhardt Jr., on ignoring a tire problem that later caused him to crash at Sunday’s Nextel Cup race at Atlanta Motor Speedway:

‘I was bullheaded. Thought we could steal a third place there.’

STAT OF THE WEEK

* Tony Schumacher, above, holds the NHRA top fuel drag racing speed record at Auto Club Raceway in Pomona, 334.65 mph set in February 2005.