Race 2 Win: Sprint Cup Series Race Notes

Sprint Cup Series

Crown Royal Presents the Dan Lowry 400 - Jimmie Johnson Notes

Team 48
Richmond International Raceway

Jimmie Johnson and Team Lowe’s Racing are looking to make it three-in-a-row at Richmond International Raceway (RIR) this weekend as they vie for another victory at the .75-mile track.

In addition to his two wins, Johnson has collected three top-five finishes and two poles in his 12 career Cup starts at RIR.

TEAM LOWE’S RACING QUOTES:

JIMMIE JOHNSON ON THE RICHMOND RACE: "I'm excited to go to Richmond. We've won the last two there and that's been one of my toughest tracks. So I'm really excited to go back. Our short track program is working really well for us and hopefully we can visit victory lane again."

CHAD KNAUS ON RACING AT RICHMOND: “I enjoy going to Richmond. It’s good, it’s fun. We didn’t run well at all there for a long time and then we started running a lot better and I started enjoying it a lot more. I don’t care so much about it being a night race verses a day race, we just want to be competitive. We’ve won the last two (races) there and hope we can do it again this weekend.”

RACE NOTES:

Chassis

Team Lowe’s Racing will use chassis No. 461 as its primary in the May 3 race at RIR. In addition to a fourth-place finish at Martinsville in March, Johnson drove this chassis to two victories last fall – at Martinsville (Oct. 2007) and Phoenix (Nov. 2007). In its only start, backup chassis No. 419 finished 29th at Las Vegas in March.

Richmond

In 12 Cup Series starts at the Virginia short track, Johnson has completed 4368 of 4793 competition laps (91.1%). He has won the last two events at RIR and has three top-five finishes. His average starting spot is 12.7 and average finish is 17.8.

Career

Johnson has won at least three Cup races a season since he posted his first victory in 2002. He is the only driver in the modern era to win at least three races in each of his first six full-time seasons.

Johnson’s most recent victory at Phoenix (April 12, 2008) was the 34th of his Sprint Cup career. The win moves Johnson past legendary “Fireball” Roberts for 18th on NASCAR’s all-time wins list. Johnson has the fourth-highest win total among active drivers, behind Jeff Gordon (81), Bill Elliott (44) and Mark Martin (35).

Johnson has won Sprint Cup Series races at all but seven (Bristol, Michigan, Infineon, Chicago, Watkins Glen, Kansas, Homestead) of the 22 tracks where the series competes.

Johnson’s 10 wins in 2007 is the highest number recorded in a single season since Jeff Gordon posted 13 victories in 1998.

The four-consecutive wins scored by the No. 48 team in the 2007 Chase for the Championship ties a modern-era NASCAR record.

History

In 228 Sprint Cup Series starts, Johnson has posted 90 top five and 138 top-10 finishes. He has a top-five finish at every track on the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series circuit.

Johnson has led 5,896 laps and driven 65,752 laps in his Sprint Cup career, covering over 87,730 miles. He has finished on the lead lap 174 times.