Samsung/Radio Shack 500 - Jimmie Johnson Notes

Team 48 Texas Preview

Jimmie Johnson and Team 48 race at Texas Motor Speedway on Sunday in the seventh race of the 2005 NASCAR Nextel Cup season. Johnson holds a 160-point lead in the 2005 NASCAR Nextel Cup points race. Johnson has never finished outside the top 10 at Texas.

JIMMIE JOHNSON

TEXAS: “For the mile and a half tracks, Texas is going to be a good race. Everyone has had time to work on their setups and try to develop their mile and half stuff. During the two off weeks, I know everyone was testing at Kentucky. I definitely think that the competition is going to continue to close, especially as we move into the summer months. I think that Roush and Hendrick have been off to a great start at the beginning of the season with the mile and a half stuff. But it isn’t going to take long and those other guys are not going to put up with it and the Yates and Childress (teams) and on down the line and it is going to be very competitive.”

LEADING THE POINTS: “It is a great place to be. I just wish we were in the final ten races right now. It is nice to be where we are and hopefully we will keep this momentum rolling and have an easy transition into the final ten. But there is definitely no guarantee for that. We just need to keep gathering points for the title like we are so we can have our place in the final ten.”

SHARING INFORMATION AT HENDRICK MOTORSPORTS: “The reason we are where we are is because of the communication. The communication and the teamwork is why you have a four or five car race team. If you aren’t utilizing your teammates and pulling information from one another, it is no good. You can look at a single car operation and the resources they have and the effort they put in and they are working their butts off, but they don’t have teammates to pull information from and they struggle because of it. I don’t think I could ever predict where we would be, but we are where we are because of our four-car team operation.”

RACE NOTES

Chassis – Jimmie Johnson and his Hendrick Motorsports teammates will bring chassis No. 48-202 as the primary car this weekend. Chassis No. 48-329 will serve as the backup. The primary car finished second at Atlanta this year and won there in October. It also won both races at Lowe’s Motor Speedway in 2004.

STATS & FACTS

Career