By Mike Harris
The Associated Press

FONTANA, Calif. - Jeff Gordon has won enough championships to know when it's time to start thinking about another.

The 10th event of a 36-race season is not the time.

"We certainly keep track of (the points) and we pay attention to it," said Gordon.

He won two weeks ago in Martinsville, Va., and is third in the points, trailing series leader Matt Kenseth by 139. But the victory hasn't changed Gordon's approach.

"I think it's too early to be racing for points," the four-time Winston Cup champ said. "Right now, you just need to race as hard as you can for those top-fives and top-10s and get those wins when you can. I think the points come by racing that way."

After the first nine races of 2003, Gordon has five top-10 finishes, all of them coming in the last six races. That includes four top-fives.

He goes into Sunday's Auto Club 500 here as the only two-time winner (1997 and 1999) in NASCAR's first six races at the 2-mile California Speedway.

Dale Earnhardt Jr. is second in the standings, 78 points behind Kenseth and 88 ahead of Gordon.

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BOOKISH ANDRETTI: John Andretti and Cheerios, the sponsor of his No. 43 Dodge, played host to nearly 500 children Friday at California Speedway. The driver, a father of three young children, read them a book.

As part of a national drive to improve literacy in children, youngsters from the Fontana Unified School District were served breakfast, and heard Andretti read "The Adventures of Erasmus Twiddle."

They also got to watch NASCAR practice and qualifying, and each was given a book.

"As a father myself, I know the importance of reading and the critical role it plays in children wanting to learn," Andretti said.

As part of a program called "Cheerios Spoonfuls of Stories," the company and First Book, a national children's literacy organization, will donate 43 books to children in need in the Los Angeles area for each of the 250 laps Andretti completes Sunday in the Auto Club 500. That would add up to 10,750 books if Andretti goes the distance.

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HERTA HERE: Former Champ car driver Bryan Herta will make his stock car debut Saturday in the Pontiac 200 Winston West race.

Herta, who drove in CART races here four times between 1997 and 2001, will start 15th.

Car owner Bill McAnally hired Herta for this event after the driver went through a test last week.

"We just pulled an old car off the shelf and I figured I would run it and see how I enjoyed it," Herta said. "Why not try stock car racing this week on a track that I'm familiar with?"

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ALL GONE: California Speedway officials announced Friday that all 92,000 reserved grandstand tickets for Sunday's race have been sold.

It is the seventh sellout here in as many years for NASCAR's Winston Cup series.

Bill Miller, president of the track, said nearly 1,800 infield spaces reserved for recreational vehicles also have been sold.

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SPARK PLUGS: Chevrolet and Ford have three wins apiece here, while Pontiac and Dodge have been shut out so far. ... Six of the top-10 finishers in the 2002 California race started the event outside the top 10. ... Mark Martin has three top-10 finishes here, including one win, but he also leads in DNF's (did not finish) with three. One of those came in 1997, when he ran out of gas on the final lap and still finished 10th.