CONCORD, N.C. (AP) -- Ford needed experience and Robby Gordon wanted a higher profile.
Gordon announced Saturday he'll move his one-car, driver-owned team next season from Chevrolet to Ford, which is still reeling from the upcoming loss of Mark Martin and Dale Jarrett to other manufacturers.
Gordon, who gets his motors from Dale Earnhardt Inc., has been low in the pecking order at Chevrolet, which has seven drivers in the Chase the championship. Going into Saturday night's race at Lowe's Motor Speedway, Gordon had no victories and only one top-five finish. He'll have a relationship with Roush-Yates engine program when he switches to Ford.
``I would give ourselves a 15th-place car with where we're at,'' Gordon said. ``What we're looking to build with Ford is how do we win races again, how do we get into the top five and top 10s? We will use their tools, their engineers, their wind tunnel time and all of their engineering stuff to help them improve our program.''
Gordon hopes his addition will help push Ford compete against Chevrolet's stable and Toyota, which enters Nextel Cup in 2007.
``Ford has some good drivers. If you look at Carl Edwards and Matt Kenseth, they've got their fleet of good drivers as well,'' Gordon said. ``There was an opportunity for us to take a faster step to the top with Ford Motor Co. Chevrolet obviously has strong teams and Ford is going to need strong teams to compete against them.''
Gordon, who started his career with Ford in 1990 before switching to Chevrolet, said he won't test Fords until after he finishes the season, but didn't rule out having another driver test Fords this fall.
``We want to end our relationship with Chevrolet at the end of this year on a different note than we ended our Ford relationship 10 years ago,'' Gordon said. ``We will wait until after the season. It doesn't mean I won't have another driver putting some miles on a Ford car before the end of the season.''
Ford director of racing Dan Davis believes Gordon can become a consistent top-10 driver.
``I think Robby has the top single-car team out there,'' Davis said.
