TBO.com - TBO is Tampa Bay Online

Johnson, Knaus Carry Drive To Win

ADVERTISEMENT

By TONY FABRIZIO

afabrizio@tampatrib.com

Published: November 16, 2008

HOMESTEAD - He's a tremendous driver, but is he really better than Kyle Busch or Carl Edwards?

He has great cars, but aren't they the same as those driven by teammates Jeff Gordon, Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Casey Mears?

The answers are probably not and yes, so why has Jimmie Johnson become the best in NASCAR? Why today at Homestead-Miami Speedway can he become only the second driver in history - and the first since Cale Yarborough in 1976-78 - to win three consecutive championships?

The answer, history says, is that Johnson, in the sweet spot of his career at age 33, has been matched with the right people in the perfect situation and they've produced something truly remarkable.

Richard Petty had his family-owned and run team. Yarborough had car owner Junior Johnson when Johnson was just starting to modernize the business model of ownership. Dale Earnhardt Sr. had team owner Richard Childress, and Gordon had crew chief Ray Evernham.

Johnson, who is assured of the Sprint Cup title if he finishes at least 36th in the Ford 400, has the right ingredients with Hendrick Motorsports and ultra-intense crew chief Chad Knaus.

"Nobody does anything by themselves," Petty said. "When you get the right combination, that's when it comes together.

"You take us. We have my cousin crew chief Dale Inman working on the cars, my brother Maurice building the engines and me driving. Dale won eight championships - seven with me and one with Terry Labonte. Maurice built 260 or 270 winning engines. Together, we dominated."

Former champion Bobby Allison recalls thinking Yarborough would never win his first championship, let alone three in a row.

The difference, he said, was getting with Johnson, who would go on to become one of NASCAR's most successful team owners, winning six championships and more races (132) than all but Petty Enterprises and Hendrick Motorsports.

"Cale was a little bulldog, and usually as the season went on, he ran over somebody and ended up the victim of his own actions," Allison said. "So in 1975 we felt like the championship just wouldn't happen for him.

"Well, it happened. And then it happened in the second year and the third year. And I myself was very impressed with it, yet at the same time, I was very annoyed with it."

Ned Jarrett, twice a champion in the 1960s, also recalled that Johnson was the difference for Yarborough.

"Junior ran a really organized effort with the right support from a lot of the right people," Jarrett said. "It's the first time we saw it that well organized. Junior put that business part of the operation together and then maintained it."

Jimmie Johnson drives for a Hendrick organization that has won five other championships with Gordon and Labonte, but his success doesn't stop there.

He's been given the perfect complement in Knaus, a man he clashed with so starkly early on that team owner Rick Hendrick nearly split them up. They've worked out their differences to become the most potent driver-crew chief pair since Gordon and Evernham in the mid-'90s.

"We have two completely different personalities, and his strengths fit my weaknesses, and my strengths fit his weaknesses," Johnson said. "So I think the pairing has been really good for both of us."

Together, Johnson and Knaus have figured out how to beat the system better than anybody else - the system being the Chase, which emphasizes late-season performance.

While Busch won eight of the first 22 races this year before petering out in the Chase, Johnson and Knaus started slowly, got their cars working better and went on a tear in the Chase. Fourteen of Johnson's 34 victories during the past five years have come in the Chase.

Johnson also is in his prime at 33, an age at which some of the best drivers in history have done their best racing.

"Go look at the numbers," former champion and TV analyst Darrell Waltrip said. "When I was in my early 30s, I was at my best. When Jeff was 30, he was at his best. When Rusty Wallace was 30, same thing. Capitalize from about the time you're 30 to about 35, 38. Ride 'er on out and get all you can."

Three consecutive championships would mean a shot at four - something that hasn't been done in NASCAR, and four would mean a shot at five. There's nothing to suggest that Johnson, who figures to bring his No. 48 team back mostly intact next year, won't challenge again and again.

Gordon didn't get the chance a decade ago. After winning three titles between 1995-98, he lost crew chief Evernham to Dodge's upstart program. Gordon hasn't found that chemistry consistently since, winning only one title (2001 with Robbie Loomis).

Knaus apparently isn't leaving anytime soon.

"Thankfully they're already talking about next year," Hendrick said. "Chad is like a machine. A week ago he was telling me some plans he had next year. I hope that they're together for a long time."

Surely the pairing looks like a dynasty in the making.

Reporter Tony Fabrizio can be reached at (813) 259-7994.

Loading Comments...

Email Print

ADVERTISEMENT