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Johnson makes championship statement with Phoenix win

Sun 15th, November 2009

Avondale, AZ (Sports Network) - Jimmie Johnson is on the verge of capturing his record-setting fourth straight Sprint Cup Series championship after winning Sunday's Checker O'Reilly Auto Parts 500 in convincing style at Phoenix International Raceway.

One week after crashing in the opening laps and finishing a season-worst 38th at Texas Motor Speedway, Johnson rebounded by leading 238 of 312 laps for his fourth victory in the last five races at Phoenix. He has won the last three fall events here.

With the victory, Johnson padded his lead to 108 points over Mark Martin. If Johnson finishes 25th or better in next week's season-finale at Homestead- Miami Speedway, he will win the title, regardless of Martin's performance.

"That's a great position to be in," said Johnson, who claimed his series- leading seventh victory of the season and the 47th of his career. "We finished 38th last week, so I can't put my card down. Anything and everything that could go wrong last week did, and going into next week, we just need to show up and race smart and do our thing."

Kurt Busch passed pole sitter Martin Truex Jr. on the opening lap and led the first 52 circuits before Johnson moved to the top spot briefly. Busch ran in front for 15 laps after the first round of green-flag pit stops, but Johnson regained the position and then drove away untouchable from there.

"The first run the car was loose, and after that, the car was pretty darn good," Johnson added.

Jeff Burton finished a season-best second, and Denny Hamlin came in third. Martin, who won at Phoenix earlier this year, took the fourth spot. Truex completed the top-five.

"It was a good car and a great effort by this race team," Martin said. "We gave it everything we had today. The car was a little vulnerable on the restarts, we lost some spots and then had to battle back from that on the long runs."

Busch, last week's race winner at Texas, finished sixth, followed by Clint Bowyer, Juan Pablo Montoya, Jeff Gordon and David Reutimann.

Gordon now trails Johnson by 169 points. He will be eliminated from title contention when Johnson simply starts at Homestead.

"Even if we were a third or fourth-place car, [Johnson's team] did what they needed to do, which is no surprise because we've seen them do it many times," Gordon said. "That's why they are three-time champions and soon to be four."

The 312-lap race featured just four cautions, but two of them were for multi- car pileups which occurred during the mid-stages.

After a restart on lap 120, Brad Keselowski got hit from behind by David Ragan, creating a chain reaction. Michael Waltrip and Robby Gordon sustained heavy damage to their cars. Elliott Sadler and Erik Darnell also were involved.

On lap 169, Dale Earnhardt Jr. lost control and spun into Ryan Newman. The incident triggered an eight-car wreck, with Tony Stewart, Brian Vickers, Bobby Labonte and rookie Joey Logano among those drivers involved. Earnhardt Jr. later returned but finished 56 laps behind in 35th.