Doubters, take that! Burton back on the beam

You never want to say "I told you so." But admit it -- sometimes you just can't help it.

And admit this, too. Whether or not you had Jeff Burton on your Dickies 500 fantasy roster, any time in the first half of the race Sunday at Texas Motor Speedway, you had to be thinking Burton -- and you, by default -- were screwed.

But it's a better-than-average day when you can learn something. And even if it was no revelation to Todd Berrier, you'd better believe Jeff Burton is one tough, focused individual.

Burton earned a nomination for the 2009 "tough man award" in Sprint Cup -- if there is such a thing -- when he guided his No. 31 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet to ninth at the finish.

Ho hum, you say? Maybe, considering Burton's recent record at Texas was an average finish of seventh in his previous five starts, including one win.

But that would mean you weren't taking into consideration that Burton had flat knocked himself silly on Friday afternoon when he crashed his car during pre-qualifying practice.

How badly dazed was Burton? Bad enough that he only made a token qualifying effort, seven-tenths of a second off his best lap in that ill-fated practice, but a whopping 1.1 seconds off Jeff Gordon's snappy pole speed of 191-plus mph.

Burton wasn't feeling "as bad as that car looks" as Berrier, his 1-race-old crew chief, cracked Friday evening. But that already was after Burton had been taken out of RCR's Nationwide car for Saturday's race.

Now that ought to tell you everything you need to know about how shaken this guy was. Nobody gets out of a potential race-winning car at a track where they're a multiple past champion. Nobody would, and certainly not Burton.

But he didn't have a choice. He accepted it, put his head down and concentrated on getting ready for a battle.

And so to come through and concentrate well enough to not eke -- but wrangle his way into the top 10 by race's end, says a lot about a man's intestinal fortitude. And he didn't achieve it with a car that was a pathetic beneficiary of a fuel-mileage gamble -- oh, no. (Continued)