Jimmie Johnson Wins 7th Sprint Cup Championship

The King knew the year would come when he would have to share his championship throne. The accomplishment nearly left him speechless but those around him, including his fellow drivers, were able to express the new champion’s enthusiasm.

“I promised him I’d give him a helmet, I wanted to wait and see if I could give him this one”, Johnson said.

“It was actually seven”. All they way around the racetrack everyone was holding up seven, and it just gave me goosebumps, like, ‘Wow, what an interesting shift in things’.

“I think this format creates a lot of stress, a lot of drama, and we certainly felt like – I’m sure the world felt like anybody but Jimmie Johnson was going to win the championship with 20 to go, and then it changed so quick with a green-white-checker at the end”. Fans were in denial. Johnson’s accomplishment is arguably significantly more impressive than Petty’s or Earnhardt’s in that he did it in an era in which NASCAR competition is more intense than ever, with a large number of skilled drivers and many well-funded, technologically advanced driving teams. The win was the 15th for Hendrick Motorsports and seventh for crew chief Chad Knaus, who now only trails Dale Inman’s record eight. There was never a lap that everybody wasn’t sideways at some point on the race track. The strategy worked incredibly well.

Although Johnson’s vehicle was sent through pre-race inspection four times – three times for illegal rear axle configurations and once for an adjustment on pit road before the race, prompting NASCAR to send him to the end of the starting lineup – he spent most of the race in their shadows. He easily moved through the field in the opening laps, landing inside the top 10 consistently just before half way.

Indeed, from last to first and the top of the record books. Last year, the No. 48 team also failed to advance beyond the second round of the Chase. Johnson’s average finish of ninth in the first round easily allowed him to transfer to the Round of 12. He has now won 80 races over the course of his career, earning those victories in perhaps the most competitive era in the sport. “These guys are legends of our sport, grew our sport, made it what it is today, for guys like myself to come along and be able to compete. Most people in the situation we were just in would crumble, and he didn’t even waver”.

Kyle Larson is leading the 400-mile race. He raised both hands and sat farther back in his seat to take it all in in the split seconds before the rowdy celebration began all around him. That is really cool to see (Jimmie Johnson) up there making history.

The pressure of the moment never affected Johnson. He had to do it after starting the race at the rear of the field after he was found to have an unapproved body modification in pre-race inspection.

Kyle Busch: A bad pit stop late in the race cost the 2015 champion and his No. 18 team.

“There was this weird, comfortable confidence I had all night long”, Johnson said. “I am at a loss for words”. “I felt like something was going to happen, and I was going to be OK with it”.

Johnson probably had the worst vehicle of the four championship contenders at Homestead-Miami Speedway, but a odd sequence of events opened the track for him to take the title over Carl Edwards, Joey Logano and defending champion Kyle Busch.

The 36-year-old was caught up in a massive crash that was instigated when rivals Carl Edwards and Joey Logano tangled with just 10 laps to go in the decider.

One last caution flag caused a final restart with three laps to go, and Johnson dove low and ahead of Logano, and intro racing history.

Again, there was a calmness surrounding Johnson.

While Stewart won’t race in Sprint Cup again, he will be back in the seat of a race auto soon. Title No. 7 was attainable.

(Knaus) “Jimmie Johnson, man I am so proud of you, so proud of you. But the fact of the matter is the real spark in this whole thing is Jimmie”. “We had the vehicle to win there and I know that I did everything in my power to win the race”. I don’t know how he got that restart.

“Well, you are supposed to be side-by-side entering the box, and he was all the way behind me”. Edwards reacted quickly and decisively, turning his auto to the left in an attempt to block Logano. Edwards, Logano, Busch and Johnson are the championship finalists, all vying to win it all in the finale.