MOTOR SPORTS : GORDON LEADS WINSTON CUP PACK.

Byline: Daily News Wire Services

The first two races on the 1997 Winston Cup schedule show with remarkable clarity how slim the margin is between success and frustration.

Jeff Gordon's victories at Daytona and Rockingham have him on top of the points race, with Hendrick Motorsports teammates Ricky Craven and Terry Labonte second and third, respectively.

With only the slightest turn in the wheels of fortune, however, Robert Yates Racing's Dale Jarrett and Ernie Irvan could be the teammates leading the way in the season's early going.

At Daytona, Jarrett and Irvan were running solidly in the lead pack when they got swept up into Dale Earnhardt's late-race crash and were knocked out of contention.

At Rockingham, Jarrett led 323 laps and seemed to be unbeatable until Gordon found a high groove in the final 50 laps and relegated Jarrett to second.

Irvan might have joined Jarrett and Gordon in the fight for the win had he not been forced to pit along the backstretch at the North Carolina Motor Speedway. Even with stellar crew work, pitting on the backstretch meant that Irvan lost track position every time he came in. He managed to finish ninth.

Jarrett stands seventh and Irvan 11th in the Winston Cup points standings after two races.

``It's a pretty good sign that we're disappointed when we finish second,'' Jarrett said Sunday after his third straight runner-up finish at Rockingham. ``It's disappointing to run that well all day long and think that we had the car to do it even at the end.''

Jarrett's crew made a slight chassis adjustment when he brought his Ford in for a final pit stop, but Jarrett said it had very little effect on how his car ran. Gordon's crew, on the other hand, kept working on his Chevrolet's set-up before finally hitting on the right combination.

``I'm sure they didn't make many adjustments on their car today because it was so good,'' Gordon said of Jarrett's team. ``Sometimes when you start the race and your car is perfect, guys can catch up to you. Sometimes it's good for your car not to be perfect when they drop the green flag so you can work on it and make it better.''

Jarrett didn't spend a lot of time second-guessing his team's decisions.

``I don't know what we would have done different,'' he said. ``We really didn't slow down at the end, we were running the same speed that we had been running. Jeff just picked their pace up.

``It's unfortunate. We had a great car all day, we had everything except the last 30 or 40 laps. It doesn't really do any good to lead all those laps if you're not going to capitalize on them . . .

Irvan's fate might have been sealed when he could do no better than 32nd fastest in qualifying. He missed making the top 30 and getting a front-stretch pit stall by less than a tenth of a second.

``We don't have a lot to show for it, but we had a good car,'' Irvan said after Sunday's race. ``Pitting on the back really hurt us.

``I passed the same guys all day. I never got to DJ (Jarrett) or Gordon. I don't know if I was fast enough to race with them, but we were close.''

WINSTON CUP POINTS

1, Jeff Gordon, 360. 2, Ricky Craven, 320. 3, Terry Labonte, 316. 4, Jeff Burton, 300. 5, Ricky Rudd, 298. 6, Mark Martin, 285. 7, Dale Jarrett, 274. 8, Jeremy Mayfield, 265. 9, Sterling Marlin, 263. 10, Bill Elliott, 262.

11, Ernie Irvan, 251. 12, Ted Musgrave, 251. 13, Ward Burton, 236. 14, Bobby Labonte, 221. 15, Brett Bodine, 221. 16, Mike Skinner, 220. 17, Morgan Shepherd, 210. 18, Lake Speed, 209. 19, Dale Earnhardt, 205. 20, Geoff Bodine, 203.

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Box: WINSTON CUP POINTS (see text)