Pit Move: California

FONTANA, Calif. -- In racing, you're only as good as your last pit stop.

With 25 laps remaining in Sunday's Auto Club 500 at California Speedway, Jimmie Johnson had the advantage over Matt Kenseth heading into the pits for what would likely be both teams' last time on pit road.

However, Kenseth knew with everything else being equal, there was a good chance he'd come out first.

That was a correct assumption, especially when Johnson's team -- which had been giving him outstanding service late in the race up to that point -- picked an inopportune time to falter. When the cars came back out on the track, Johnson was fifth behind Kenseth, Jeff Burton, Kevin Harvick and Hendrick teammate Jeff Gordon.

"I think our pit stops were good all day, but our last one was one of the faster ones and it got us in position," Kenseth said. "As much as being a great stop, we did come in second and I think the 48 had some troubles."

Johnson admitted the final stop wasn't what his team was hoping for.

"I don't know exactly what went on in our pit stop but we were just slow on that stop," Johnson said. "It's hard from my perspective to tell you what went wrong, but we definitely lost some time."

That was almost the reverse of green flag stops that occurred some 30 laps before, when Johnson pitted early in the sequence and grabbed the lead away from Kenseth.

Interim crew chief Chip Bolin, filling in for the suspended Robbie Reiser, said his crew thrives on the head-to-head challenge that comes when all the leaders are pitting at the same time with the race on the line.

"Our guys, their expertise and their skill level, tend to shine under caution because everyone comes in under it," Bolin said. "You don't factor in speed in and speed out. It's just whoever's got the fastest pit stop is going to shine, and the group of guys we've got are really good. That's why you usually get that much attention."

Bolin said even though he wasn't in attendance, Reiser's preparation was a key to Sunday's victory.

"Robbie's got it all laid out, and I just go about doing what I always do and then just kind of pick up the slack on the things that he does," Bolin said. "The group's been together so long and runs so flawlessly that we're just following what we're supposed to be doing, and it pretty much builds."

Of course, Kenseth had to do his part on the final two restarts.

"I was real concerned about spinning the tires," Kenseth said. "We've got excess horsepower, especially in second gear with these hard tires, and it's very easy to spin them when they're used. I did spin the tires -- usually when I spin the tires I'm not real smart, I hold the gas down and it just goes slower and spins them faster -- and I was able to breathe it a little bit and I could feel them hook up again and I was able to launch a couple of car lengths away."