Jeff Gordon cruised through the pressure of a Chase elimination race on his way to a victory at Dover last Thursday. This season NASCAR will be using a 10-race format to eliminate drivers from every third race in the Chase. This year, Dover was marked as an elimination race.John Jellinek

With the next round looming, three separate winners were automatically qualified by taking checkered flags. Jeff Gordon, Brad Keselowski and Joey Logano all earned berths in the next round with their wins. While Kurt Busch, AJ Allmendinger, Greg Biffle, and Aric Almirola were eliminated from contention for the championship.

Gordon posted his fourth win of the season at Dover while collecting his 92nd checkered flag overall in his career. Along with Gordon from Hendrick Motorsports, Kasey Kahne also qualified for the next round by grabbing the 12th and final spot in the elimination cutoff. Kahne was forced to battle the entire race in order to finish 20th overall and lock in his position in the next round of the Chase.

The Chase for the Cup Rankings, are below:

1. Brad Keselowski

2. Joey Logano

3. Kevin Harvick

4. Jimmie Johnson

5. Jeff Gordon

6. Kyle Busch

7. Dale Earnhardt Jr.

8. Matt Kenseth

9. Ryan Newman

10. Carl Edwards

11. Denny Hamlin

12. Kasey Kahne

The next three-race elimination round begins on October 19th at Kansas Speedway. This round will be hosted by Kansas, Charlotte, and Talladega. Nerves are at ease for the time being until the next round begins, and with a quarter of the drivers in the current field set to be eliminated, competition will be ramped up the next time the engines are started.

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