Jimmie Johnson One Step Closer
Posted by Morgan Ferguson on Mon, Nov 16, 2009 @ 10:54 AM
Jimmie Johnson bounced back from his misfortune of finishing 38th last week in Texas to dominate the race this weekend in Phoenix and moved one step closer to his fourth NASCAR Sprint Cup Championship. When you lead 238 of 312 laps, you demoralize the competition and put an exclamation point on a great season. The win on Sunday was the 7th of the season and 4th in the last 9 races of The Chase and 47th career win - what a year. Now Johnson has a 108 point lead over second place
Mark Martin with one race to go at Homestead next Sunday. The challenges this weekend came from the
Safety-Kleen sponsored Richard Childress Racing team with Jeff Burton being the standout finishing second. Denny Hamlin was also strong, but lacked the horsepower to run with Johnson's Chevy and had to settle for third with Jeff Gordon in fourth. Polesitter and Safety-Kleen driver Martin Truex Jr. finished fifth, his first top five of the year in his next-to-last race for Earnhardt Ganassi Racing. Truex will drive Michael Waltrip Racing's No. 56 Toyota next year and Safety-Kleen will be on his Toyota for the 2010 season. Thanks to Les Bell for a fine job this weekend with the services for the teams and the coordination of the pit tours on Sunday. Don't miss Homestead next Sunday afternoon. Tune in on ABC and watch history in the making. Johnson should sew up his fourth championship and the Hendrick Motorsports teams will finish one, two and three in the championship.
