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 He wants to win either at Kansas Speedway or Charlotte Motor
Speedway so he doesn't have to worry about potential chaos at
Talladega (Ala.) Superspeedway.
Johnson advanced comfortably from the Challenger to the Contender
Round of the Chase with a third-place finish in Sunday's AAA 400 at
Dover International Speedway. Johnson has been a quiet presence in
the Chase thus far, and on Sunday, he never had enough speed to
challenge either race winner Jeff Gordon or runner-up Brad
Keselowski.
The six-time Sprint Cup champion hopes to change that, however, when
the series moves to Kansas and Charlotte for the first two races of
the Contender Round. Johnson craves a victory at one or both of the
two tracks.
"I'd love to win at Kansas or Charlotte to take Talladega out of the
mix and not have to stress about that, but we'll see how things go,"
Johnson said. "Talladega is definitely the wild card. If I'm one of
the guys that wins at Charlotte or Kansas, it's sure going to make
the race at Talladega fun.
"Otherwise, you're just going to be on pins and needles and
stressing like crazy. That's the strategy; really try to win one of
those first two so you can go to Talladega, pull them tight and let
it rip."
Rookie Kyle Larson, who finished sixth on Sunday, had a different
suggestion.
"Hopefully, I can be the guy that wins Kansas and Charlotte so all
the Chase guys can be nervous going into Talladega," Larson quipped.
CLEAN SLATE FOR HAMLIN
For Denny Hamlin, Kansas is just like starting over.
Hamlin overcame last week's disaster at New Hampshire--a fueling
problem and a wreck--and raced his way into the next round of the
Chase by a four-point margin over AJ Allmendinger.
But now that the Chase field is pared to 12 drivers and reset to
equal points, Hamlin can afford to be more aggressive.
"I feel great," said Hamlin, who finished 12th in the AAA 400. "You
never know what can happen. I knew we had a car that was capable of
racing our way in, but I didn't think it was going to be that close.
We just started fading there at the end. A little bit on the
defensive on my part, but still we lost the handle. Just happy this
all resets and all starts from scratch again and we've got another
life."
From Hamlin's perspective, that life is about to become more
enjoyable, at race tracks that are in his wheelhouse.
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"The tracks just keep getting better for us as this Chase goes on,
so we're sitting in good shape," Hamlin said. "We're as level as
anyone right now. This is going to be a great comeback story if we
can keep going."
MOMENTUM FOR LOGANO
Joey Logano posted an inconspicuous fourth-place finish at Dover
without leading a lap, but the superb consistency of his entire team
has engendered optimism on the part of Logano and the No. 22 Team
Penske Ford.
With a victory and two fourth-place finishes in the first three
Chase, Logano has ample reason to be excited entering the start of
the Contender Round at Kansas Speedway.
"We had three top-fives in the first three races here in the Chase,
so that's important," said Logano, whose average finish of 3.0 is
best among the Chase drivers. "We've got to do that again and again
to be able to win this championship.
"We've got momentum. The part I'm most proud of is that we're
executing. Even if we don't have the best race car, we execute to
make sure we have a nice solid finish out of it one way or the
other, so we have to keep doing that throughout the rest of the
Chase."
The only thing Logano regrets is that the results of the first three
races don't carry over into the next round.
"As consistent as we've been and as good as we've been running I
hate to see it reset," he said. "You're like, 'All right, this is
three good finishes, a win in there, this feels good!'
"But now we're all tied again, so it's like that's all out the
window. It's nice we're able to go to the next round, but after
that, it's over and you've got to start over and go again."
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