Jeff Gordon eclipsing Dale Earnhardt's career Cup victory total at Talladega would be like Barry Bonds eclipsing Hank Aaron's home-run mark in Atlanta.

Let's just say neither would be popular with the hometown crowd.

Jeff Gordon is already bracing himself for an unfriendly reaction at Talladega like the one he got in '04. (AP)

Talladega Superspeedway is the epi-center of "Earnhardt Nation," a place where rabid fans have embraced "The Intimidator" and subsequently his son Dale Earnhardt Jr. feverishly for 30 years.

What was once a sea of black, with fans sporting the colors of Senior's famous No. 3 paint job, has evolved into a sea of red for Junior's No. 8, making Talladega a place where any driver winning without the last name Earnhardt unpopular.

That could spell trouble for Gordon on Sunday if he does win the Aaron's 499. Gordon already endured the wrath of some Earnhardt devotees last week, when he tied Senior's mark of 76 career wins in Phoenix.

That response angered Earnhardt Jr., who took those so-called fans to task.

"I don't think it's cool," Earnhardt Jr. said. "It ain't cool at all. Go out in the parking lot and wail a couple beers at your own car. Don't throw them at my car or anybody else's, for that matter. Take a couple shots at your own. I think it's ridiculous, to be honest with you."

To his credit, Gordon has been taking all of this fervor in stride.

"It wouldn't be a lot different than any other reaction that I have gotten when I won at Talladega," Gordon laughed, probably remembering his controversial 2004 victory over Junior that elicited a hailstorm of beer and soda cans, trash and a few coolers from the grandstands.

Although he has a chance to break Earnhardt's victory mark at the track where the late seven-time Cup champion is so revered, Gordon is quick to give credit to all he learned from the restrictor plate king.

"Earnhardt was just a master at this place," Gordon said. "You'd watch him and see some of the things that he'd do, and you'd shake your head going, 'It's not possible. He must be cheating.' But years later I started to understand how he was able to do some of those things. That plays a big role in any win I've had there."

Another Talladega win Sunday would give Gordon five at the mammoth 2.66-mile superspeedway, tying Earnhardt Jr. at the top of the list.

But Earnhardt Jr. would most likely have six Talladega wins to his credit if not for last October's final lap mishap that saw Brian Vickers take out Junior and Jimmie Johnson as the trio raced toward the checkered flag.

Vickers went on to score his first career Cup win while Earnhardt and Johnson's cars sat crumpled in the infield.

Earnhardt Jr. is using that incident as motivation Sunday.

"I believe we have about half-a-lap of unfinished business there," he said. "It fires me up -- it fires my team up -- and we want to go out there and not give anyone a chance to take us out this time."

Sunday's race is the second restrictor plate event of the year, with Kevin Harvick winning the first one in the wild season-opening Daytona 500.

Since that win, however, Harvick's season has gone sour and he has slipped back to 11th in the standings. He'll try to right things Sunday but will have to shoot for a second straight plate win in a different car, since his 500 winning piece is sitting at the Daytona USA museum.

But Harvick doesn't see that as too much of an obstacle.

"The cars have become so different from Daytona to Talladega," Harvick said. "At Daytona, you work so much on finding the right setup so it will handle in the draft and late in a run. I think it has become a different car for almost everyone. I know for us we had planned on bringing a different car to Talladega, so it isn't that big of a deal that we don't have our 500 car."

Tony Stewart is another driver looking to overcome a disappointing start to the season and who will no doubt be in the spotlight this weekend after his controversial comments against NASCAR this week.

Stewart, who dominated the first half of the Daytona 500 before getting knocked out in an accident with Kurt Busch, has never won at Talladega and has six second-place finishes, including a runner-up run in last year's Aaron's 499.

"You can say the track hasn't been kind to me with as many second-place finishes as we've had, but there are 41 guys who didn't have it as good as we had it those days," Stewart said.

"There have been a lot of days where we ran second and it was as good as a win for us. Last year's spring race was a perfect example. We knew we didn't have the best car, but we ended up with a second-place finish. That was the best we could do and we left the track with smiles on our faces."

After the week Stewart has gone through, any kind of smile at all would be rare sight indeed.