Daytona Beach, Fla. – Cheater or champion? Such is the stigma that Jimmie Johnson has to bear after winning his first Daytona 500 just 10 days after his crew chief was kicked out for illegally altering his car.
Johnson won a two-lap shootout Sunday to claim the victory, capping a roller-coaster week that saw NASCAR send Chad Knaus home after he cheated during qualifying.
Just moments after Johnson crossed the finish line, his rivals were wondering if the win was legitimate.
“This could still be the first opportunity for NASCAR to pull away a victory if the thing is illegal,” third-place finisher Ryan Newman said. “It’s disappointing. I think a lot of Jimmie Johnson and his talent, but I’m pretty sure at least three of his last four wins have had conflictions with the cars being illegal.
“You know, it’s not necessarily good for the sport.”
Johnson posted the fifth-fastest time in trials, then won The Great American Race on his fifth try at the Daytona International Speedway.
“I knew deep down inside my heart that this team could still win this race,” Johnson said in Victory Lane. “There’s no doubt that not having Chad here was a huge handicap, but everybody stepped up. I am just so proud of this team.”
Johnson stayed calm and avoided trouble in a wild race that saw Tony Stewart eliminate three contenders: Jeff Gordon, Matt Kenseth and himself. Then Johnson worked his way to the front, staying in line and waiting for his chance to pounce.
It came with 14 laps to go when he squeezed past teammate Brian Vickers to grab the lead just as a caution came out. Johnson was at the front of the field on the restart, the lead driver in a single-file pack of cars sprinting toward the end.
From his rearview window he could see Dale Earnhardt Jr. slicing his way through the field, making a last, desperate push to mark the five-year anniversary of his Dad’s death with a win at the track where he died.
But Jamie McMurray wrecked with seven laps to go to bring out one final caution. It set up an overtime finish, but no one was able to challenge Johnson.
Earnhardt was the first driver to pull out of line and make a run at Johnson, but got no drafting help and had zero chance of catching him. Then Newman took his shot. But just like Junior, he didn’t get any assistance and could only squeeze back into place.
There were no more challenges to Johnson, who won when a final accident brought out the caution and allowed him to cross the finish line under a yellow flag.
“It’s been a tough week for us,” Johnson understated. “I wish Chad Knaus was here – I’m sure he’s kicking his TV in right now.”
Casey Mears, part of the three-man team that won the 24 Hours of Daytona sports car race earlier this month, was second and Newman, who was trying to give Roger Penske his first Daytona win in 33 tries, finished third.
Stewart was fifth, rookie Clint Bowyer was sixth and Vickers was seventh. Earnhardt wound up eighth after leading a race-high 32 laps. Ken Schrader and Dale Jarrett rounded out the top 10.
Johnson stayed under the radar – and away from Stewart – to pull out the victory.
Earlier this week, Stewart forced NASCAR to crack down on bump drafting and aggressive driving when he warned that someone could be killed in the 500.
Then he became the first Cup driver to be penalized under the new watchdog policy.
He began his day by hitting Gordon – a heavy favorite to win a second straight 500 – early in the race to eliminate him from contention. Then Stewart took out a second potential winner when he made a hard left turn into Kenseth.
It wasn’t clear if Stewart’s contact was intentional, but it severely damaged Kenseth’s car and NASCAR quickly penalized Stewart by ordering him to the back of the field. The punishment dropped him from fifth to 34th.
Clearly angry, he pushed his in-car camera away so television viewers couldn’t see him raging.
Just seconds later, Kenseth exacted his revenge as the two cars raced each other off pit road. Kenseth passed Stewart, ran him low to the apron and appeared to hit him. NASCAR then called Kenseth into pit road for his own penalty, but the driver was irate and slow to comply.
“You’ve got to come in, Matt, they are going to pull our scorecard!” crew chief Robbie Reiser radioed.
“Not until they tell me what I did. I put my hand up, asked him, ‘Why did you do that?’ That’s all I did,” Kenseth replied.
“What did I do?” “You were screwing around with (Stewart), you have to come in,” Reiser said.
It didn’t really matter at that point. Kenseth, who had led four times for 28 laps and had a car capable of racing for the victory, was two laps down and had too much damage to his Ford to rally for the win.
“It’s just really disappointing – Tony went out and said all that stuff early in the week,” Kenseth said after the race. “If he’s worried about peoples lives and he’s going to wreck somebody at 190 mph, that’s tough.”
