Jamie McMurray savors victory on his way out the door at Roush Fenway

By ANTHONY ANDRO

aandro@star-telegram.com

Jamie McMurray doesn’t sound like a driver who’s worried about an uncertain future.

Who can blame him?

McMurray, whose contract with Roush Fenway Racing is up after this season, comes into Sunday’s Dickies 500 at Texas Motor Speedway feeling good.

He won for the first time in more than two years on Sunday at Talladega Superspeedway. He’s posted six top-10 finishes in 11 Sprint Cup starts at TMS. And he believes he’s close to finalizing his plans for the 2010 season.

So there’s no need to send any sympathy cards the direction of the No. 26 Crown Royal Ford hauler.

"Our sport, since they’ve changed the points format, is about making the Chase," said McMurray, who is 22nd in points. "Certainly winning helps, but it seems like it’s about making the Chase. We were not able to do that in the years we were here [with Roush Fenway] but getting to win is the next best thing."

He’ll try to make it two straight Sunday as he starts 22nd. Jeff Gordon won the pole with a speed of 191.117 mph. Points leader Jimmie Johnson will start 12th.

McMurray’s victory last weekend was eclipsed by the two late crashes and NASCAR’s pre-race warning to teams to avoid bump drafting in the turns. Still, McMurray had the dominant car and earned the victory, which was Ford’s first since the second race of the season.

Despite running in the back of the pack for most of the race, he led a race-high 32 laps and was able to win for only the second time in his three years with the team.

He didn’t mind that most of the postrace attention didn’t center on his win.

"I didn’t care about any of that," he said. "We were racing and I was excited for my team and my crew chief [Donnie Wingo]. I really didn’t care that it was overshadowed by Ryan Newman’s comments [about the accidents] or Jimmie Johnson having a 7,000-point lead going into the weekend."

The win certainly put some welcome attention on McMurray, who won his first Sprint Cup race in his second start in 2002. The well-spoken Missourian is the top free agent for 2010.

He’s one of the top candidates for the No. 1 ride for Earnhardt Ganassi Racing. McMurray, who is losing his ride because Roush Fenway has to cut its teams from five to four to comply with NASCAR’s cap, wouldn’t get into specifics about his future. But he said he expects an announcement soon.

McMurray is more concerned about this weekend. TMS has been a good track for Roush Fenway cars. The first Sprint Cup winner at TMS in 1997 was Jeff Burton, who drove for Roush. Six other drivers from the team have won since then.

McMurray, whose best finish at TMS was second in the spring of 2005, would like to add to that list. If he does, it will kick in an extra bonus for charity. Crown Royal will donate $50,000 to Century Council, a charity that has a focus to eliminate drunken driving and promote responsible decision making.

Winning again for himself and a charity sounds good to McMurray.

"I told my wife the other night it’s so good to win a race at the end of the year," he said. "You get to enjoy it, whereas if you win the third or fourth race of the year and if two months later things aren’t going well, you don’t remember it. This is one of my favorite racetracks and one of my best finishing tracks."

Anthony Andro, 817-390-7760

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