Thanks to his victory in the AAA 400 at Dover, Jimmie Johnson has collected 5 wins at Dover International Speedway. That puts the three-time defending champion in some pretty fast company, right alongside David Pearson (who also has five) and just a couple if victories behind Richard Petty and Bobby Allison (each have seven).
At least some of the competition made it interesting for a while. Ryan Newman captured the lead from the pole-sitting Johnson on pit road after the competition caution at lap 25.
On lap 31, Joey Logano went on one of the wildest rides anyone has had in recent memory on "The Monster Mile." Jay Busbee has the video on this edition of "From The Marbles." As Logano and other drivers around him checked up, Tony Stewart got into the back of his one-time protege, sending the rookie into a wild flip. Though Logano and the other drivers collected- Robbie Gordon and Reed Sorenson- came out okay, the collision served as reminder to the safety value of the "C.o.T."
Kurt Busch made gains with a very good run, eventually taking the lead from Newman. He at least added some air of suspense by giving Johnson an early run for his money. The "48" would take the lead from the "Blue Deuce", but not before Busch gave him a real fight.
From there, it was pretty academic. Juan Pablo Montoya jumped into the fray, Matt Kenseth made a late surge, and Mark Martin fought his way through the field to capture a second place finish, keeping an ever-so-slim lead in the points.
Juan Pablo Montoya has demonstrated with another top five that he’s a serious entry in the race for the chase. His fourth place finish puts him 65 points behind Martin in third. Kurt Busch’s fifth place run boosts him to fourth. It was a case of "same song, different verse" for Jeff Gordon. He fought his car and wrestled to a sixth place finish. Fellow chasers Kasey Kahne finished eighth and Ryan Newman was tenth.
Perhaps the surest sign that the Roush Fenway cars just don’t have it for a championship run was evidenced by the finishes of Carl Edwards and Greg Biffle. Their finishes of 11th and 13th at a track they both run well at seems to indicate there just isn’t a championship run in them.
Kudos to Tony Stewart for fighting his way forward to a ninth place finish. Oddly enough, it’s his first top ten since his win at Watkins Glen, if you can believe that.
Denny Hamlin’s championship hopes took a hit as he finished 22nd. Dover has not been kind to him historically, and this day would be no different. Brian Vickers’ hopes of serious contention were not help with an 18th place run.
How long has it been since Matt Kenseth ran in the top five? If you guessed Dover- May 31st- you’d be right. Great day for the "Killer Bees" in what has been a frustrating season, as Kenseth takes third. A call also goes out to A.J. Allmendinger, who took seventh. Non-chasers Kevin Harvick, Marcos Ambrose and Clint Bowyer also took away good things from this race.
At the end of the day, however, it was Johnson’s day. You just know at Dover, and any number of other tracks, if he unloads a competitive (and when doesn’t he?) car, and avoids mistakes, there’s not much you can do with him. You pretty much have to do what Kurt and Martin did, take as much good as you can for yourself, and hope to make up the difference somewhere else. The car, his mastery of the track, the genius of crew chief Chad Knaus, and his motivated crew are just too much to overcome.
You can sell that conspiracy theory cheating nonsense to the tin foil hat gang down the road (make sure you knock real hard on the thick metal at the top of their underground bunker)- we ain’t buying that rubbish here. I’m not what you’d call a Jimmie Johnson fan, but I think I know brilliance when I see it. Brilliant is what this team is.
Makes you wonder if that concrete came from Lowe’s, doesn’t it?
PHOTO CREDITS- 48 car by Chris Trotman/ Getty Images.
