Motorsports

Johnson's birthday hopes end early with a bash

By TIMES WIRES
Published September 18, 2006

LOUDON, N.H. - Eighty-nine laps into NASCAR's Chase for the Nextel Cup championship, title hopeful Jimmie Johnson found himself in a deep hole.

Johnson, one of the 10 drivers racing over the final 10 Cup races for the 2006 championship, saw his 31st birthday go sour early. His No. 48 Chevrolet was already low on power from running on seven cylinders, just trying to keep up with the rest of the field, when Sterling Marlin, trying to avoid a braking car, knocked Johnson into the wall.

"The thing was still running right, no vibration or anything like that, so we thought maybe a plug wire or a plug was what was wrong with it," Johnson said. "We came in and looked at the plug wires, but we couldn't find anything there.

"We were just trying to get to the next caution so we could look at it again. Unfortunately, we were the next caution."

The crash was a hard one and it took Johnson's Hendrick Motorsports crew 45 laps to get it good enough to go back on track and run for points. Johnson soldiered on and climbed from 41st to 39th.

He fell from second in the standings to ninth, 139 points behind Kevin Harvick.

"We've got to figure out what went wrong with the engine," Johnson said. "The engine problem was what got us back there and got us in the wreck."

Teammate Kyle Busch was the only other Chase driver to have a bad day Sunday.

Early in the race, he damaged his car running into the rear of Joe Nemechek of Lakeland on the fourth lap of the race. Busch pitted too soon and was penalized to the rear of the pack. He then hit the wall hard on Lap 199, and finished 38, 146 points back.

ROUSH FUTURE: There will be a rookie in Roush Racing's No. 6 Ford next season, and it could even be Todd Kluever.

Team owner Jack Roush anointed Kluever two years ago as the driver to take over the 6 when longtime star Mark Martin retires. But Kluever's progress through the Craftsman Truck Series and Busch Series has been slow, and Roush said two weeks ago that Kluever might no longer be the driver to move up in 2007.

Before Sunday's race, Roush team president Geoff Smith said the owner will make a choice for the No. 6 driver within the next two weeks from among four rookies: Kluever, David Ragan, Danny O'Quinn and Erik Darnell.

"That's Jack's call," Smith said. "He'll make that decision. But there will be a rookie in the 6 next season."

Ragan, 20, and Darnell, 23, are currently in the truck series. Kluever, 27, and O'Quinn, 21, are in Busch. None has won a race this season, and Darnell is the highest in season points at 11th.

Smith also said details on a contract for Martin to run full time in trucks next season have been resolved, and he expects it to be signed in the next week. He also said there is a possibility that Martin could run a limited Cup schedule with the new team headed by driver Boris Said.

POWER LOSS: Electrical power to the New Hampshire track blinked out just minutes before the start of Sunday's race. But the event started right on time, thanks to generators that kept all of the equipment, including timing and scoring, running.

The TV broadcast by TNT was also able to continue without interruption until full power was restored after just four laps had been run.

Ted Christopher's car was held in the garage until after the power came on because his spotter, who apparently was stuck on an elevator, had not reported to the spotters' stand at the top of the grandstand.

Officials said an auto accident away from the track knocked down high voltage lines.

SPARK PLUGS: Rookie Denny Hamlin finished fourth, his fifth top-5 and 14th top-10 finish this season. ... Harvick's victory was the 16th in 27 races this season for a Chevrolet driver and clinched the 2006 Manufacturers Championship for the General Motors brand. Chevy has won that title 26 times.

[Last modified September 18, 2006, 02:41:01]