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closeJohnson, 48 team stretch their gas, get Phoenix win
JIM UTTER
The Charlotte Observer
Saturday, Apr. 12, 2008
AVONDALE, Ariz. - Jimmie Johnson won his second consecutive Cup championship last season taking gambles.
He took another Saturday night to win his first race of the 2008 season.
With a large lead and little gas, Johnson practically coasted across the finish line to win the Subway Fresh Fit 500 at Phoenix International Raceway, electing not to make a late-race stop for gas.
Johnson finished 8.07 seconds ahead of Clint Bowyer, who also did not make a late stop. Denny Hamlin finished third, Carl Edwards fourth and Mark Martin fifth.
“We were getting really good (gas) mileage all day, especially on the long run,” said Johnson’s crew chief, Chad Knaus. “We didn’t have the capacity we wanted, but we had the mileage we wanted.”
The race got off to a slow start, in part because NASCAR delayed the green flag while it awaited the conclusion of the Boston Red Sox-New York Yankees baseball game. The game was being shown live on Fox and had been interrupted earlier in the day by rain.
NASCAR officials pushed back the start about 15 minutes, then decided to go green as Fox moved the baseball game in most of the country to FX, but viewers still missed the start of the race.
Once the race was under way, Johnson and Edwards wasted little time making their way to the front. Matt Kenseth's became the first car in the garage and out of contention after blowing a tire and hitting he wall on Lap 42.
Joe Nemechek spun on Lap 115 to bring out the third caution of the race, but the timing also caught Jeff Gordon, Greg Biffle and Edwards on pit road making green-flag pit stops. Edwards also received a penalty for his pit crew starting work on his car too early.
With the race under caution, the rest of the field pitted, but Johnson still led when the race returned to green on Lap 122.
Pole-winner Ryan Newman’s engine blew on Lap 133, which brought out another caution, but the oil his car left on the track sparked a five-car wreck that included Kenseth, Jeff Burton, J.J. Yeley, Johnny Sauter and Reed Sorenson.
The amount of oil and the accident forced NASCAR to put out the red flag for nearly 10 minutes to clean the track. Johnson continued to lead when the race returned to green on Lap 141.
During the race’s fifth caution, several of the lead-lap cars – Johnson's among them – elected to pit on Lap 149 while others, including new leader Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s, stayed out and set up two different pit strategies.
Elliott Sadler’s blown engine brought out the next caution on Lap 162, and those who stayed out on the previous caution, including Earnhardt Jr., elected to pit. Martin inherited the lead when the race returned to green on Lap 168.
Earnhardt Jr. continued to hold the lead through the next two cautions and, with 80 laps to go, was followed by Martin, Hamlin, Kevin Harvick and Kyle Busch.
