Comfort zone
Johnson hopes to bust slump at site of last win
DOVER, Del. — Jimmie Johnson wore a helmet painted in tribute to boyhood racing hero Cale Yarborough. Then he went out and tied the Hall of Famer on NASCAR’s career wins list last June at Dover International Speedway.
For Johnson, winning here had become the norm — his 11 wins on the concrete track known as “The Monster Mile” are easily the record. That victory was already his third of the 2017 season, and the hunt for a record-breaking eighth Cup Series championship was roaring ahead.
Until it stalled. Johnson had just two top-10 finishes in the next 12 races, fell out of title contention and never finished a race better than third for the remainder of the season. He opened this season by crashing out of the Daytona 500, and he has just one top-five finish in the 10 races held so far in 2018.
The 42-year-old Johnson, who won his most recent season championship in 2016, is accustomed to racking up the types of milestones that are all but certain to make him a Hall of Famer. But his return to Dover marks a rather ignominious occassion — 33 races have passed since his win at the track, and he’s riding the longest losing streak of his career.
Will the comfort of racing somewhere he has had so much success finally end the skid, or will Dover become just another place where his frustration continues?
“We’ll get it close, and history shows that,” Johnson said of his potential finish after he starts 19th in today’s race. “Hopefully we get it perfect, and we can have the day that we really want to have and get back to victory lane. But it does take a little pressure off me knowing that this is my best track and knowing that this is my favorite track.”
The Hendrick Motorsports driver swept Dover’s races in 2002 and ’09 and won once at the track in ’05, ’10, ’12, ’13, ’14, ’15 and ’17. With his most recent victory, he joined two NASCAR Hall of Famers as drivers who have won at least 11 races at a single track — Richard Petty won 15 apiece at Martinsville and North Wilkesboro, 13 at Richmond and 11 at Rockingham, while Darrell Waltrip won 12 at Bristol and 11 at Martinsville.
Johnson’s 83rd career victory tied him with Yarborough for sixth all-time. Waltrip and Bobby Allison are next at 84.
“I think we have created an environment of very high expectations because of the success we’ve had, and I think people forget how special our run has been,” said Johnson, who has worked with crew chief Chad Knaus from the start of his Cup Series career. “We certainly want to get back into those ways and have it happen again.
“But history shows it doesn’t happen very often. And we’re very fortunate to harness lightning for a long stretch of time.”
His biggest loss, though, is an impending one. After this season, Lowe’s will exit after 18 years as the only Cup Series sponsor Johnson has had, and rights are for sale on the No. 48 car for the first time since before the 2001 season.
Then there is the matter of changes from his manufacturer. Chevrolet switched its car body to the Camaro before the season, and Austin Dillon’s win in the Daytona 500 is the only one for a Chevy driver this season and Kyle Larson’s pole position-qualifying run on Friday was just the second for Chevy in 2018.
Toyota drivers won eight of the final 10 races in 2017, including the championship for Furniture Row Racing driver Martin Truex Jr.
“I think we have been the benchmark or that high watermark for so many years,” Johnson said, “that other manufacturers and teams invested a couple of years in figuring out how to beat us.”
Larson, who won the fifth pole of his Cup Series career, isn’t quick to blame the Camaro for the Chevy drivers’ collective funk.
“I’ve never been one of the guys that has said we’ve been behind where we were last year with the new Camaros,” he said. “I’ve felt like our team has done a really good job of taking what we had last year with the SS and then putting everything that we learned through that into the Camaro and been just as fast.”
Still going strong
Joey Logano topped the speed chart in the second practice Saturday, a strong run after his first win of the season this past Sunday at Talladega Superspeedway in Alabama.
He failed to make the playoffs last year even with a win — NASCAR essentially stripped him of all benefits that came with his April 2017 win at Richmond because of a rear suspension violation. Last week’s victory in the Team Penske No. 22 Ford stood, however, essentially qualifying him for the playoffs.
“I didn’t want to go through that again,” Logano said. “There is a little feeling of relief knowing that we are in the playoffs. The goal has changed. When you start the season, it is always to win the championship, which you have to take one step at a time.”
Injury adjustment
Daniel Suarez will start seventh today as he tries to build on consecutive 10th-place finishes. The second-year Joe Gibbs Racing driver broke his left thumb in a race last month at Texas Motor Speedway, but since then he has been 11th at Bristol and turned in the back-to-back top-10 results at Richmond Raceway and Talladega.
“It’s not painful at all,” said Suarez, who expects to drive with a brace for two more weeks. “It’s just not 100 percent comfortable because I can’t really grab the wheel how I want.”