Martin going full bore into Chase, but still reserved

RICHMOND, Va. -- Mark Martin enters this weekend's kickoff for the Chase for the Sprint Cup as the No. 1 seed, but it wasn't until the checkered flag fell Saturday night on the Chevy Rock & Roll 400 that he allowed himself to believe that even contending for a championship was possible.

His season, and his career, has taught him to this point that it's easier to deal with disappointments -- and there have been many -- than to go delirious with false expectations.

But in running in the top-five positions for the entire 400 laps at Richmond International Raceway, Martin proved he's one of three-time defending Cup champion and Hendrick Motorsports teammate Jimmie Johnson's chief competitors for the 2009 crown.

But he refused to let himself believe it until the checkered flag.

"I was happy about [the performance] but we did the same thing at Atlanta and the same thing at Bristol and we did the same thing at Michigan -- now, you have to remember, at Michigan, we ran out of gas at the end, and that took our cushion that we were building up," Martin said. "We did the same thing at Indy, as well; so that kind of performance is really exciting."

Martin shared the post-race dais with Ryan Newman and brought a chuckle from Newman when he said he'd had nothing to do with his cars' performance -- that it was all due to crew chief Alan Gustafson.

"When we started off the year, we were running sixth and seventh and stuff like that, and I was really pretty excited about that," Martin said. "But you know, we needed to make our stuff a little bit better and we managed to do that. And the cars were better everywhere we are going now -- we are making them handle better.

"Make no mistake, Alan Gustafson is the reason we've had all of the success that we've had this year. I'm not -- it's Alan. Our chance, our opportunity to work together, is really coming together. And I trust him to make decisions on that race car that I don't check behind and I don't ask questions.

"I just strap in and mash it."

Despite the success he's achieved in that manner, Martin wasn't the only one among the 12-man Chase field who deflected any thought of a favorite -- of course beyond Johnson, who's made the Chase virtually his own private domain.

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Mark Martin talks about his exciting performance at Richmond and his hopes for his team in the Chase.

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"We'll see how things fare here," Martin said. "But anybody in this Chase can win this Chase. Every team that's in it is capable of putting together a 10-race roll. That's all it takes is the magic 10 races, and anybody can win it."

Martin gained the top seed and its 5,040 points through his four victories in the 26 preliminary Cup races. Tony Stewart, who led the championship for the past 13 weeks, and Johnson are seeded second and third, respectively, each 10 points behind Martin based off their three victories to date.

As he's said all year -- even since he and owner Rick Hendrick announced Martin's deal in the middle of last summer -- Martin's living for the moment and trying not to get too far ahead of himself, but Saturday night in the afterglow of his stout fourth-place finish, he was certainly looking at ease.

"[Being in the Chase] is certainly cool -- I'm certainly going to enjoy that for a week here," Martin said. "I feel like a whole new person, huge weight off my shoulders. It's just like I said before, to make this thing is the icing and now we get to go race for the cake."

Martin said all his previous hopes, dreams and expectations, and there were many in the six previous times he'd finished second in the championship race, were being diminished this season.

"Of course I'm living in it now, but to me, this is certainly the best year of my career -- the most fun," Martin said, before pausing and acknowledging the pressure of racing for the Chase. "Since Chicago, some of that fun has been sort of smothered out by all of the pressure. We are in, we are out, we are in -- all that.

"But the thing that I'm excited about is our race team has been so strong since Chicago. The cars have gotten better and better on the race track, and Chicago, Indy, Bristol, Michigan and here -- I don't think we ever ran outside the top five, and those are the kind of race cars and the kind of effort that you have to give to be a championship contender."