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DOVER, Del. -- Even those who have been around the sport for a long time are amazed to hear the litany of Jimmie Johnson accomplishments at this week's NASCAR Sprint Cup Series stop, Dover International Speedway.
His 10 -- yes, TEN -- wins at the Monster Mile is an all-time record. His Dover tally alone is actually more than the career win totals of 25 drivers he'll compete against in Sunday's AAA 400 Drive for Autism (1 p.m. ET, FS1, MRN, SiriusXM).
His 2,999 career laps led at Dover is also the most from any active driver. And the six-time champion has won three of the last five races here.
All that greatness surely helps balance the irony and disappointment of Johnson's Chase-costing 41st-place finish in the series' last Dover visit in October.
"That was human error, it was something that we did wrong as a race team and cost ourselves a shot at the Chase when were in the fall race," Johnson recalled.
"You're going to have bad experiences at all tracks. People are going to make mistakes. Drivers are going to make mistakes even if it's at their favorite track. It doesn't matter.
"My love for this track; I fell for it on my first lap in an ASA car back in the '90s and it's still just as cool now as it ever has been."
And it would seem if Johnson's love of track is somehow reciprocated.
His success on one of NASCAR's toughest one-milers is factually amazing. In addition to his 10 victories, Johnson has 15 top fives and 20 top 10s in 28 starts plus five pole-position starts, for good measure. Twice he has won from the pole.
It's the kind of track mastery that used to happen more regularly in NASCAR's "glory days" of Richard Petty, Darrell Waltrip and Dale Earnhardt, but sure doesn't occur frequently in the modern era. Kind of like winning six championships in just eight seasons.
"To have my favorite track to drive turn out to be one of my most successful race tracks, at this point in my career, it's just cool to see it all converge and come together," Johnson said.
"The experience around the track is so intense and so fun, I guess it's the only track that we compete on that really reminds me of my motocross or off-road roots with the transitions into the corners and off the corners. I came here in an ASA car maybe '97 or '98 and just fell in love with the track then and was very fast and competitive then."
Johnson arrives in Dover this week ranked fourth in the championship standings, 37 points behind Dover pole-sitter and the season's title leader Kevin Harvick. But Johnson already has a pair of wins (at Atlanta and Auto Club), which qualifies him for the 2016 Chase.
He will start the No. 48 Lowe's Chevrolet 21st on Sunday -- the grid set by opening practice speeds since qualifying was rained out. It's only the fourth time in the last 15 races he has started outside the top 10.
He was 12th- and 13th-fastest, respectively, in the final two practices on Saturday. And he had the eighth-best 10-lap average.
"We definitely get fired up knowing this one is coming up," Johnson said. "When we get here and then in moments like what we just had in practice where we didn't have the speed we wanted. It adds actually more frustration than it would at a normal track.
"Because we are like, 'man, this is our place,' this is where we run well, why are we off?
"There is a balance for sure."
And no one better to find it.