At Dover, no questioning the state of 24's support

DOVER, Del. -- Jeff Gordon has been coming to Dover International Speedway for 16 years to race Cup cars, and each spring he makes an additional stop in the northern part of the state. There he spends the day meeting with executives and employees of the company that sponsors his No. 24 Chevrolet, his presence the center of attention at an event that attracts about 4,000 people. One year, he drove his show car through the streets of downtown Wilmington. This past Thursday, he announced a two-year extension.

It's always a very big deal, with radio-controlled cars and eight No. 24 show cars and a variety of tents and exhibits creating almost a fair-like atmosphere. But when you're in Delaware, and you drive for the company that's defined Delaware for more than 200 years, nothing less is expected.

Gordon may work for Hendrick Motorsports, the four-car super-team that's won seven championships in NASCAR's premier division, but twice a year it becomes very clear how closely tied Gordon is with DuPont, the chemical company based in Wilmington that's backed his racecar for 16 years. Thursday, on stage with the company's chief marketing and sales officer and with thousands of employees in attendance, Gordon announced that the longest-running relationship between driver, owner and team in NASCAR would go on for at least another two more years.

Of course an announcement like that had to happen in Delaware, at DuPont's annual combination of NASCAR day and employee appreciation day, with the Sprint Cup haulers lined up and ready to enter the 1-mile Dover track. It had to happen in a state where French émigré E.I. DuPont founded his gunpowder company on the banks of the Brandywine River in 1802, a state bisected by the DuPont Highway, a state where DuPonts have served as governors, senators, and congressmen, a state where for decades, according to a 2002 Fortune story, DuPont employees made up at least 10 percent of the legislature.

For years it was the state's largest private employer, a decade ago with nearly 13,000 people, or nearly 4 percent of Delaware's workforce, on the DuPont payroll. The rise of credit card companies, which loved the state's corporate-friendly tax laws, eventually cut into that number. But as of 2006 more than 8,800 people in Delaware were still employed by DuPont, an entity so familiar and influential that those in the First State once referred to it simply as "the company." No further identification was necessary.

"You go to Wilmington, it's almost like it's DuPont. It's their city," said Gordon, who's never had another primary car sponsor at the Cup level. "They employ so many people, they have buildings spread throughout the entire city, they have such a presence not just in Wilmington but in all of Delaware. You can get that understanding and sense when you've been going to their headquarters. They have their own hotel. There aren't too many sponsors out there that have their own hotel. And it's a really nice quality hotel, too."

Jeff Gordon

Dover Cup stats

Races	30
Wins	4
Top-fives	13
Top-10s	18
Poles	3
Avg. Start	10.0
Avg. Finish	12.3

Of course. They own their own country club, too, which has hosted the LPGA Championship. Their name is on everything from the top of the headquarters building in Wilmington to the children's hospital in Dover to a pediatrics practice in Georgetown to a nylon plant in Seaford. They're almost synonymous -- Delaware and DuPont.

"With a company the size of DuPont in a state the size of Delaware, we've been an influential part of every aspect, from the state government to many other things, just because of sheer numbers," said Larry Deas, the company's motorsports manager. "We have a number of manufacturing sites and obviously a huge corporate headquarters here, so we've got a large portion of the population working for DuPont. Naturally, that's going to influence other things."

That influence does not stop at the gates to Dover International Speedway, the concrete oval in the tiny capital city. Amid the crowd of 130,000, there are always plenty of DuPont employees and Delawareans who see Gordon's No. 24 squad as their home team. Twice a year, it seems, he's not racing for just DuPont, but an entire state.

"If you look at typical tracks on the East Coast -- and this is non-scientific, this is walking through the crowds -- it seems at Dover there's more of a preponderance of Jeff Gordon attire than there are at many other East Coast locations. Now, you go to the West Coast, those are heavily Jeff Gordon, Jimmie Johnson type crowds. But I definitely think Dover lends itself more to Jeff because of our presence in the state," Deas said.

"But at the same time, and this is probably true of every company, every DuPont employee isn't a Jeff Gordon fan. There are a number of people I know in the company who are big NASCAR fans who have a favorite driver who isn't Jeff Gordon. They're not anti-Jeff like some of the crowds are at some places, but he is not the favorite driver of every employee at DuPont. I know that. But certainly the majority look upon him as an employee. As one of us."

And Gordon clearly feels the same way. "I feel like I've been an employee of DuPont's for 16 years," he said. It doesn't hurt that he typically fares well on the track at Dover, a place that Deas admits the company's upper management pays a little more attention to, and a place where Gordon has four victories and 18 top-10s in 30 careers starts. Sunday he'll start seventh on what's become something of a home track.

"I think it definitely motivates us to do well here," he said. "I remember in the early years coming up here and having their big NASCAR day at their headquarters and all the employees coming out and supporting us, I felt a little extra pressure to step it up here in their home state. Fortunately, we went on to have some great runs and great success here ever since then."

The opinions expressed are solely those of the writer