Jimmie Johnson took his eighth grandfather clock home from Martinsville Speedway on Sunday by winning the STP Gas Booster 500. The five-time Sprint Cup champ took the checkered flag in front of Clint Bowyer and seven-time Martinsville winner Jeff Gordon.
Johnson led 346 of the race’s 500 laps on his way to the win, his second of the 2013 Sprint Cup Series season. The win also returned Johnson to the points lead,
"I think the fact that we had just such a calm weekend was the biggest part," said Johnson on NASCAR.com. "It's easy to start chasing things here and get yourself off track. We always race well, and fortunately here you pit a lot and you can make big changes to your race car to get you in the ball game. We've won races where we were just terrible to start the race, having no fun. (Crew chief) Chad (Knaus) is throwing spring rubbers in the car and the track bar is coming up or down, wedge in and out, all those huge, huge changes, and we get ourselves in contention.”
The win was the 20th for Hendrick Motorsports at Martinsville, tying the team with Petty Enterprises in all-time wins. "There's just certain tracks where the drivers that Hendrick has had over the past, as well as now - and just our race cars - it just really suits that," said Gordon. "Qualifying up front really can be huge here. You get a driver like Jimmie and a team like the 48 - or ours as well, or the 15 (Bowyer)- you put them on the pole in that No. 1 pit stall, and it's going to be really, really hard to beat them."
Kasey Kahne and Kyle Busch rounded out the top five. Danica Patrick, making the first start of her career at Martinsville, finished 12th after starting from the back after an engine change.
“You know, it was just nice to have a good weekend after having so many that weren't good since Daytona,” said Patrick. “Yeah, it was a fun little track. I was told that if it goes well, you'll be like, I don't mind this place at all, let's come back, and if it doesn't you don't ever want to see it again. Today was one of those days I had a good car, and (crew chief Tony) Gibson has got a good track record here, obviously (Ryan) Newman won this race last year, and he's always run really well. I think the team has a lot to be proud of. The stops were good. We had a little right front damage from early in the race so it was a little bit of a pain in the butt to get that tire off and then back on for stops. But it was good to get the Go Daddy car up there.”
The Sprint Cup Series goes under the lights next Saturday, April 13th, at Texas Motor Speedway for the NRA 500; they’re joined by the Nationwide Series for the O’Reilly Auto Parts 300 on Friday night, April 12th. Keep up with the latest on NASCAR at www.nascar.com.
Quotes in this piece provided by NASCAR.
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