In an exciting finish to the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race at Talladega Superspeedway, Jimmie Johnson wins a close one in the final second of the last lap, pushed by Dale Earnhardt Jr.. Later, Johnson gave the checkered flag to Dale Earnhardt Jr. in appreciation for the team work and the push. Plus the excitement of the finish was pummeled on us and there is no doubt, it was an exciting win under this new format of “plate racing.”
Jimmie Johnson, driver of the #48 Lowe's Chevrolet, crosses the finish line ahead of Clint Bowyer, driver of the #33 BB&T Chevrolet
On Sunday I wrote about how some fans were grumbling about the different style of racing at NASCAR restrictor plate races this year. I didn’t disagree with them and my initial reaction to the different racing wasn’t too enthusiastic. Over on NASCAR.com, there’s a poll going in, where so far over 36k votes have been placed asking, “Do you prefer pack racing or two-car drafting on the superspeedways?”
A resounding 73% of the respondents prefer the pack racing. And I get that. It’s a very high anxiety kind of race that messes with your mind until everyone has crossed the finish line and slowed to 100! But then there’s the premise that I had pointed out some time back that the last 15 to 20 laps can make or break how a fan feels about an entire race. And boy, with that in mind, that was one heck of a race folks!
After a few single car slip ups from the tandem draft and a fair sized wreck in the race, we managed to avoid the ‘real’ “big one” where half to two-thirds of the field usually finds itself eliminated from one slipped up move. No, Sunday, we had a pack of cars and the best cars broke away from the pack.
'Aaron's 499,' Dale Earnhardt Jr pushes Jimmie Johnson to the win
As they were coming down to the last few laps, the 2-car drafts were spread out but working effectively together. Team mates helping team mates is an awesome sight to see indeed. With one lap to go, I didn’t realize how close it would be. But that last corner and last one thousand feet of racing at 190-200 mph definitely made it something to talk about for years to come.
When those eight cars were vying for the checkered flag, it was an incredible finish indeed. Sure, we’ve seen more cars stacked up at the finish line. Heck, we’ve seen the top 30, 25 cars stacked up bumper to bumper with barely a second splitting the difference between first and 20th, but today the new draft is needed due to the added measure of safety restrictions to keep the cars under a specific and dangerous speed. OK, well, more dangerous than 200mph.
Jimmie Johnson won the race by 2/1000′s of a second. That’s a bit on the close side, and he was followed by a high-speed blur of paint that technically, specified that:
1 Jimmie Johnson
2 Clint Bowyer
3 Jeff Gordon
4 Dale Earnhardt Jr.
5 Kevin Harvick
6 Carl Edwards
7 Greg Biffle
8 Mark Martin
9 David Gilliland
10 Joey Logano
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So today as it stands, I might be more the fan of this new kind of racing. There was less massive damage wrecks, though Kurt Busch helped three folks spin off the race line and Ryan Newman was a victim twice to getting tapped out… both times by Denny Hamlin!
But we didn’t have the huge wreck we tend to see.
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Yellow Line Drama
Of course, there’s a bit of drama about Jimmie Johnson’s win. If you look closely , you’ll see he dips into the yellow line while he’s passing Mark Martin to the inside. I can’t tell if he actually crosses both lines or not OR if he’s improved his position while down there.
Some folks are saying he did, yet NASCAR is saying that he did not. There’s a great image of the moment (and great article on the issue by Bob Pockrass) over on Scene Daily, and for me, it removes most of my doubt. So be it.
Strange Notes About Yellow Line Rule
In the Scene Daily article noted in the previous paragraph, they touch on the tiny detail that the “yellow-line rule is not addressed in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series rulebook.” Considering all the crazy deals we’ve seen come from this “rule” and how it’s been enforced for a few years now, I’m surprised that’s the case, if accurate.
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In the video below, jumping to the 1:37 mark will get you to the last lap of the Aaron’s 499 NASCAR race at Talladega.
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