Jimmie Johnson Wins at Charlotte, Chase Drivers Falter

Originally written for CLNS Radio.

Jimmie Johnson locked himself into the Round of 8 following a victory in Sunday’s Bank of America 500 from Charlotte Motor Speedway.

Johnson returned to victory lane after a 24-race winless drought.  Johnson and his team have shown speed the last few weeks, which hasn’t been the case for Hendrick Motorsports throughout the year.

Jared C. Tilton (Getty Images)

“When you drive for Rick Hendrick and have all the great people at Hendrick Motorsports working for you…I just knew it was taking way too long,” Johnson said.  “We knew we’d get back; it was slower than we wanted it to be.”

Johnson led 155 of 334 laps on Sunday.  After restarting on the outside most of the day, Johnson said the track conditions changed before the final restart.

“The track got so slick that I found out that restarting on the inside turned out to be a little bit better,” Johnson said.  “I was able to throw it inside of [Kenseth] in Turn 3 and made the pass.”

Five Chase drivers stumbled at Charlotte, putting themselves in a hole for the rest of the second round.  Kevin Harvick and Denny Hamlin had engine failures, while Joey Logano made hard contact with the wall and had to spend time in the garage.  Austin Dillon and Chase Elliott were involved in a big accident on a restart with 80 laps to go, leaving them outside the top 30.

Unofficial results:

1. Jimmie Johnson

2. Matt Kenseth

3. Kasey Kahne

4. Ryan Newman

5. Kyle Larson

6. Kyle Busch

7. Brad Keselowski

8. Kurt Busch

9. Tony Stewart

10. Jamie McMurray

11. Danica Patrick

12. Carl Edwards

13. Martin Truex Jr.

14. Michael McDowell

15. Aric Almirola

16. Chris Buescher

17. Clint Bowyer

18. Trevor Bayne

19. Landon Cassill

20. Ricky Stenhouse Jr.

21. Regan Smith

22. Brian Scott

23. David Ragan

24. Michael Annett

25. Matt DiBenedetto

26. Jeffrey Earnhardt

27. Cole Whitt

28. Reed Sorenson

29. Josh Wise

30. Denny Hamlin

31. Ryan Blaney

32. Austin Dillon

33. Chase Elliott

34. Paul Menard

35. Greg Biffle

36. Joey Logano

37. AJ Allmendinger

38. Kevin Harvick

39. Alex Bowman

40. Casey Mears

Jerry Markland (Getty Images)