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Jimmie Johnson foiled Brad Keselowski‘s dominant day Sunday at Texas Motor Speedway, rallying to win the AAA Texas 500.
Johnson led just six laps but denied the eight remaining contenders in the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup playoffs an automatic berth among the championship-eligible quartet. His fifth win of the season was his sixth at the 1.5-mile Fort Worth track and the 75th of his premier-series career.
Johnson’s Hendrick Motorsports No. 48 Chevrolet led the final four laps of the 334-lap race, bypassing Keselowski’s Team Penske No. 2 Ford after applying heavy pursuit during the final green-flag stretch. Keselowski — the Coors Light Pole Award winner in Friday qualifying — led 312 of 334 laps, winding up 1.083 seconds behind Johnson at the checkered flag.
“I just kept pressure on him,” Johnson said in Victory Lane. “I could see that he was really tight and that was the first I had seen him that vulnerable all day. I just kept the pressure on him, kept searching for a line. He saw me coming on the top and protected it. I just kept trying to put pressure on him hoping for a mistake.”
Kevin Harvick, who led 11 laps and ran in second place for much of the race’s middle portions, overcame a pair of punctured tires — a left-rear 36 laps in and a right-rear with 52 laps remaining — to finish third. Kyle Busch finished fourth and Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota teammate Carl Edwards fifth as title-eligible Chase drivers claimed seven of the top nine spots in the final order.
Fellow Chaser Kurt Busch took seventh. Martin Truex Jr. finished eighth, fading after a fender-clanging duel with Keselowski shortly after the race’s final restart.
Jeff Gordon, who had already clinched a seat at the championship table with last weekend’s win at Martinsville Speedway, finished ninth.
Joey Logano had the worst day of the remaining eight championship contenders, suffering a blown left-rear tire on Lap 10. The shredded rubber blasted away his fender and sent the Team Penske No. 22 Ford into a spin, ultimately forcing him to the garage for repairs.
Logano wound up with a 40th-place finish, 66 laps off the pace. His sizable deficit in the standings means he will need a victory in next Sunday’s Eliminator Round finale at Phoenix to be among the championship quartet in the season-ending event Nov. 22 at Homestead-Miami Speedway.
“Sometimes you just have to roll with the punches,” Logano said. “We will be ready for Phoenix. This team is strong. We didn’t take any wind out of our sails today and we showed how fast this thing was even after we crashed. I am very proud of our team.”
For Harvick, the latter tire issue pushed him back to 21st place, one lap down, but the race’s ninth caution period worked in his favor, helping him back to contention. The defending Sprint Cup champ also dealt with a balky shifter that kept his Stewart-Haas Racing No. 4 Chevrolet jumping out of gear in the late stages. Harvick drove the final third of the race with one hand on the wheel and one on the shifter to combat the issue.
With Sprint Cup practice washed away Saturday and little rubber worked into the already abrasive surface, a handful of tire issues cropped up. Besides Logano and Harvick, Dale Earnhardt Jr., Kyle Larson, Trevor Bayne and Ryan Newman were among those bitten.
Kyle Busch, Harvick and Truex cling to the remaining provisional berths in the championship race based on points. Edwards, Keselowski and Kurt Busch join Logano below the cut line.
Rookie Erik Jones, making just his second Sprint Cup start, finished 12th in place of the suspended Matt Kenseth in the Joe Gibbs Racing No. 20 Toyota.