GEARING UP

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

1. Mark Martin will make his 700th career start in what is now NASCAR’s Sprint Cup series in the Auto Club 500 on Sunday at Auto Club Speedway.

The Arkansas native and fan favorite, who’s co-driving the No. 8 Chevrolet for Dale Earnhardt Inc. this season, started his first Cup race April 5, 1981, at North Wilkesboro (N.C.) Speedway. He finished 27th.

Since then he has won 35 races, 41 poles and scored 239 top-five finishes.

Martin, 49, also made 621 consecutive starts from 1988 to 2007, when he opted to drive only a partial schedule. He’s splitting driving duties this year with 23-year-old Aric Almirola.

“It’s not really how many races you started that matters, it’s how fast you went,” Martin said. “I have to thank each and every crew chief and each and every crew guy that played a part in everything we were able to do over the past 20-plus seasons.”

2. The field for Saturday night’s Stater Bros. 300 NASCAR Nationwide race at Auto Club Speedway includes Jason Leffler, a native of Long Beach.

Leffler, 32, drives the No. 38 Toyota Camry for Braun Racing and finished third in title points last season. He gave Toyota its first win in Nationwide competition last year with a victory at Indianapolis.

This will be his ninth start at California, where his best finish was seventh in 2005. Leffler finished 19th in the season opener last weekend at Daytona International Speedway.

3. TV viewership of the Daytona 500 on Fox last Sunday increased from a year earlier, according to figures from Nielsen Media Research reported by Fox.

The race, celebrating its 50th anniversary, averaged 17.8 million viewers, a 1% increase over the 2007 race.

Fox said 33.5 million Americans watched at least part of the race, up 2% from a year earlier.

The network also said the Daytona 500 “remains far and away the top-rated event in American motor sports,” with ratings more than double those of the Indianapolis 500 last year.

4. The NHRA’s Powerade drag-racing series resumes this weekend at Firebird International Raceway near Phoenix.

The defending winner in the funny car class is Tony Pedregon, who suffered minor burns after his car exploded in flames in the first round of the season opener in Pomona two weeks ago.

Rod Fuller hopes to defend his top-fuel victory in Phoenix last year, but reigning series champion Tony Schumacher is a three-time winner at Firebird.

5. Danica Patrick said she is the “most comfortable I’ve felt” as she enters her fourth year in the IndyCar Series, still in search of her first win.

“This is the most excited I’ve been going into a season,” she said. “I feel I’ve really come into my own.”

Patrick, 25, drives the No. 7 car for Andretti Green Racing. She burst on to the motor sports scene in 2005, when she led 19 laps in the Indy 500 and nearly became the first woman to win the race.

--

LIFE IN THE FAST LANE

Tony Stewart, two-time Sprint Cup Champion,

on racing at Auto Club Speedway the week

after the season-opening Daytona 500:

‘I enjoy going to California

because I really feel that’s where our season starts.’

--

STAT OF THE WEEK

Dario Franchitti, above, now competing in NASCAR’s Sprint Cup Series, won the final open-wheel race held at California Speedway with a victory in the IndyCar Series event on Oct. 16, 2005.