Nothing Surprising About Jimmie Johnson's 10th Win at Dover...or Anything Else
Jimmie Johnson won at Dover International Speedway for the 10th time. The winner of six Sprint Cup championships is also the winner of more races (four) this year than anyone else. The other multiple-race winner, and reigning champion, Kevin Harvick, finished second.
Johnson led 23 laps. The last 23.
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“Insane,” he said. “What a long, hard-fought day to get to the front.”
Ten victories at Dover. Richard Petty and Bobby Allison, each of whom won seven, are unlikely to catch up. Petty’s last Dover win was in 1984, Allison’s in ’83. Jeff Gordon won last year. He’s got five.
Johnson and his sometimes grating crew chief, Chad Knaus, were happy again. They had bickered in Charlotte. The plot of their 14-year relationship is not unlike that of Felix Unger and Oscar Madison in The Odd Couple. It works, though. Famously. Historically.
“I’m actually fairly pleased with the way we’ve been performing,” Knaus said in the media conference, as if victories in 31 percent of the races this year was no more than adequate.
Why, their Charlotte sniping barely came up at all afterward, and when it did, Knaus ignored it.
Ever the perfectionist, Johnson said, “Man, I feel like we’ve had good cars in race circumstances.”
Race circumstances. That’s the time to be fast, all right.
“Qualifying, in raw speed, hasn’t been our strong suit,” Johnson added, addressing raw circumstance and inventing it. “That’s set us up for some long Sundays, as we all know.”
Johnson has failed to finish in the top 10 four times.
“Gosh,” he added, “in one race I didn’t even get a chance to qualify, and we came back and won, at Atlanta.”
Golly. Gee whillikers.
Sound familiar? Wait. There’s more.
| Wins | Laps Led | Best | Worst | Average Finish |
| 3 | 211 | 1 | 40 | 7.14 |
Martin Truex Jr., who has done everything but win, failed to do so again. The Busch brothers, Kurt and Kyle, found unexpected trouble.
Darrell Waltrip caused millions on television to groan at his corny quips, obviously having added “he’s sideways, slideways!” to his repertoire of low humor. Sidekick Larry McReynolds extolled the virtues of “four fresh tires” all day long, right up until the moment when Johnson won by not having them.
Waltrip deftly turned to “track position”; as did Johnson. In the infield command center, Michael Waltrip, Darrell’s kid brother from the dude ranch, thought almost everything was “amazing.” Chris Myers yukked it up alongside, seeming with his deadpan humor to ask, “Just why am I here again?”
Oh, Jeff Gordon was good, not great, and slipped into 10th at the finish. The Penske Fords of Brad Keselowski and Joey Logano were 11th and 12th, respectively. Charlotte winner Carl Edwards self-destructed in several ways, most crucially speeding on pit road, and limped home 19th—his car number.
And, in spite of her ballyhooed “moxie and heart,” Danica Patrick spent almost the whole race in the nether land between one and three laps behind and finished the usual 15th, two laps back but ever chipper at the end. According to Chevy PR, she said the usual, “I’m confident we can build on this heading into the next few races.”
Ho hum. It was an exceedingly predictable, standard, regular, garden-variety Sunday afternoon at the old race track. Dover isn’t a mile-and-a-half. It’s paved in concrete. It’s bumpy, and the cars bounce around a little more than "Las Texicharlantakansas," but the results were the same.
It was a little more fun to watch, less smooth and a bit more squirrely.
Some feelings were hurt. Truex was bent out of shape at Kasey Kahne, running wing man to teammate Johnson.
“I just went to the bottom, and I think he was a little upset,” said Kahne to Fox Sports. “I don’t know what to say.”
Another Fox interviewer, Matt Yocum, asked Truex about his “hiccup” with Kahne.
“It wasn’t so much his hiccup,” said embattled Truex. “Our car was inside him, and he run me down on the apron, so I had to either wreck him or wreck all of us.”
Truex, a nice fellow in spite of it all, took a third option and did neither. He led 131 laps and finished sixth. Pole winner Denny Hamlin led 118 and wound up 21st. He ran afoul of another Toyota driver, Clint Bowyer, while trying to get back to the front. He took it in stride.
“[Bowyer] just said he was sorry,” Hamlin said on TV, almost yawning. “He ran into the back of us and wrecked us. That was it.
“We were on those new tires, and I thought we were really going to make some hay, and we got clear of the [No.] 15 [Bowyer]...and we never even got a corner through before we got turned around. Disappointed, but we really didn’t have a winning car at the end of the race.”
Johnson had “the winning car at the end of the race”—it being Dover. He won for the 74th time overall, drawing within two of the late Dale Earnhardt’s career total. He trails Earnhardt in championships by one.
Plus, when Johnson climbed out of his Chevrolet, he recited all the appropriate sponsors faultlessly, adding that he rode (presumably a bicycle) 52 miles on Saturday because “it helps me learn about hydration and nutrition and getting ready.”
Chalk up another W to hydration and nutrition. Earnhardt never cited those ingredients in his championship mix.
“I’ve got a great rhythm. I’ve got great support at home,” Johnson added, sounding exactly as if those two qualities were somehow affiliated. He thanked his little girls, who were “sitting at home on the couch.”
Harvick has finished second seven times. Dover marked the halfway point of the regular season. It’s sort of understandable that his recent explanation for most every development has been “it’s just like always.” Last week it was “there’s always been aero push.” This time it was “Johnson always wins at Dover.”
In his media conference, Harvick said, “I mean, this is a good race track for [Johnson]. They had everything line up for them and had a good car, and they had a good car in practice and were able to make it happen for them at the end on the restart. He’s just good here.”
Same old same old.
All quotes are taken from NASCAR media, team and manufacturer sources unless otherwise noted.
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