Stewart wins, Johnson takes Chase lead at TMS
All I know is that Jimbo better choke & someone else better step up to win this championship. I don't want Jimbo to win it at all!!!
Stewart wins, Johnson takes Chase lead at TMS
By Mike Harris, The Associated Press
November 5, 2006
11:23 PM EST (04:23 GMT)
FORT WORTH, Texas (AP) -- While the tense battles of NASCAR's Chase for the championship rage on, Tony Stewart is driving in a world of his own.
It just so happens that Stewart's world is way out in front of all the drama.
"Smoke" led 278 of 339 laps, including the five extra laps because of a late caution, and often was so far ahead that he appeared to be all by himself on the track.
Most of the action was well behind him, where Jimmie Johnson quietly grabbed away the point lead from Matt Kenseth by 17 points with a second-place finish. Stewart easily raced away to his second straight victory and third in the eight Chase races run so far this year.
"I thought we had the perfect car all day," Stewart said. "It was just an unbelievable day. I've been racing for 27 years and I can count on my hands the number of times I've had a car like that."
Sunday's race tightened up the championship, with Johnson, Kenseth, Dale Earnhardt Jr., rookie Denny Hamlin and Kevin Harvick separated by just 105 points with two races remaining. All of them finished among the top 12 on Sunday.
"This was a wild night, but a good one for us, all in all,'' said Johnson, who came into the race trailing Kenseth by 26 points. "We just have to keep working, keep running hard and scoring points.
"We've had so much fun racing for this since we got down [in the points] early. We just want to keep having fun,'' said Johnson, who has three runner-up finishes and a win in his last four starts.
Harvick finished third, followed by Kyle Busch, rookie Clint Bowyer and Earnhardt, who had a miraculous day.
Earnhardt, still feeling the effects of the flu that has dogged him all week, hung in at his favorite track and kept his title hopes alive. Junior somehow overcame a sick stomach, a bounce off the wall, seven pit stops for repairs and a penalty for speeding on pit road to move from fourth to third, 78 points behind Johnson.
"Not too bad," said Earnhardt, who fell all the way from second to 33rd after hitting the wall. "The first part of the race, I didn't feel good at all. I drank so many fluids, I had heartburn and all kind of bad stuff going on in there. Then, as the race went on, I got to feeling better.
"I'm just sorry we couldn't do any better than we did."
Kenseth started 36th, the worst of any of the contenders, struggled with handling throughout the early part of the race and also overcame a speeding penalty. At one point, the 2003 champion thought he had a tire going down and almost pitted under green. But he stayed out and somehow stayed out of trouble, finishing 12th.
Hamlin was never in contention but hung on for a 10th-place finish that dropped him from third to fourth, 80 points behind the leader.
Stewart, a two-time Cup champion and last year's title winner, missed the 10-man, 10-race Chase this year by just 16 points and decided to spend the rest of the season padding his victory total.
He won last month at Kansas by gambling on gas and coasted under the checkered flag. But Stewart was dominating last week at Atlanta, leading 146 of 325 laps, and even stronger Sunday on the 1.5-mile Texas oval.
And being out of the playoffs hasn't stopped him from enjoying himself.
As has become his post-win routine, Stewart stopped his No. 20 Joe Gibbs Racing Chevrolet at the finish line and joyfully climbed the flagstand, to the delight of the big crowd. Stewart nearly slipped a week ago on the way up at Atlanta and, this time, NASCAR flagman Rodney Wise reached out to help him up.
Jeff Burton, who began the day tied with Earnhardt for fourth, just 84 points behind Kenseth, saw his championship hopes destroyed when a tire blew on Lap 89, sending him hard into the wall and relegating him to a 38th-place finish and seventh place in the standings, 184 points out of first.
Kasey Kahne, who won the spring race at Texas and leads the Cup Series with six victories this year, was the only driver able to even challenge Stewart on Sunday. He was right behind on a restart on Lap 262 and made a couple of tries to get by the leader. But Stewart wasn't having any of it and slowly pulled away.
Late in the race, it looked like Kahne would get one more shot at Stewart when a caution came out on Lap 327. But, seconds later, Kahne pulled onto pit road with an engine failure that ended any chance of a win or a championship. He fell to 10th, 290 points behind in the Chase.
Mark Martin, who started the day 201 points out, never got into contention after having to go to a backup car following a crash in Saturday's practice. He finished 22nd and fell 253 points behind Johnson.