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Jimmie Johnson.
A worldwide household name, Johnson has reached remarkable feats in the racing world. This weekend could represent a pinnacle in his racing career, as he runs for his seventh championship at Homestead-Miami Speedway, the opportunity to tie the great Richard Petty and Dale Earnhardt for the most all-time Sprint Cup Series championships within reach.
But “Six-Time” wasn’t always that way: Former Hendrick Motorsports teammate and No. 48 car owner Jeff Gordon recalls when Johnson wasn’t a world champion, a race winner or even a Sprint Cup Series driver.
He was just Jimmie.
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Gordon remembers a tremendously fast, red, white and blue car that took the track at an XFINITY test at Darlington Raceway back in 2000.
“I was helping Ricky Hendrick — (team owner) Rick (Hendrick’s) son — who was getting in the XFINITY Series and wanted to run a few races and Darlington was one of the races on that schedule,” Gordon told NASCAR.com on Thursday. “… So, I went down to Darlington for a day of XFINITY testing and I remember going out there on top of a truck … and a car was out there — it was a red, white and blue car. Really had a nice line, carrying a lot of speed, right up next to the wall. You know, Darlington’s a very intimidating track and usually it takes not just a lot of skill but experience to understand the track.”
Gordon complimented the driver’s style, telling Hendrick “that’s pretty much how you need to do it.” Then he asked who the driver was.
“Jimmie Johnson,” Gordon recalls Hendrick answering.
With his seemingly experienced motor skills, Gordon wondered how many times Johnson had raced at “The Track Too Tough to Tame.” Hendrick surprised Gordon by telling him he thought it was his first time.
Gordon wanted to meet him.
“I remember going down to the garage and Jimmie was sitting in his car and I went over there to him and said, ‘Hey, what’s up, how are you?’ and introduced myself,” Gordon said. “I said, ‘So, have you ever been here to Darlington before?’ And he said, ‘Nope, today’s the first time I ever saw the place.’
“That to me in itself kind of floored me — it looked like he had been there for years; tremendous speed,” Gordon admitted. “So, I started watching him from that point forward.
“… To me, (he) was an overachiever for the team and the equipment.”
Jimmie Johnson: A 24-year-old “overachiever” without a future ride, Sprint Cup win or championship to his name.
Sounds about right for someone who would later be christened “Six-Time.”
RELATED: Johnson through the years in photos
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The date is August 19, 2000.
The now-XFINITY Series heads to the rolling Irish Hills of Michigan International Speedway. Already a three-time now-Sprint Cup Series champion under the Hendrick Motorsports umbrella, Gordon is making his fourth XFINITY start in the No. 24 Gordon-Evernham Motorsports ride.
After the drivers meeting, Johnson approaches Gordon.
“(He said), ‘Hey, I’ve got some opportunities and some people talking to me and I’d love to pick your brain about it and get your opinion,'” Gordon recalled. “So, I was impressed that he was willing to come up and ask me and I felt honored that he thought to do that.”
The veteran driver was even more impressed during the race.
“I was running, I think third or fourth or something on a late restart,” Gordon said. “… I had a faster car than him all day long, but on that final restart he made a big, bold move and passed me, and I was like, ‘Whoa!’ I was like, ‘This guy’s got some real skills here.'”
GALLERY: How Johnson became ‘Six-Time’
During that time, Hendrick Motorsports was a three-car team, fielding the Nos. 5, 25 and 24 cars out of three-separate shops on the Concord, North Carolina, campus. But soon, more teams began to adopt the four-car team concept, where each of the cars worked together to share information and were seeing positive on-track results.
“When I left that Michigan race, I remember calling Rick (Hendrick) and I said ‘You know, I was just racing in the XFINITY race — Jimmie Johnson is extremely impressive … I really think that we could build this fourth team and hire him,'” Gordon said.
Hendrick had met Johnson through his son Ricky, as the pair were friends. But he worried about a lack of sponsorship for a no-name rookie out of El Cajon, California.
But Gordon was relentless.
“Maybe a week or two went by and we talked some more about it,” Gordon said. “and Rick said to me … ‘Listen, if you’re that adamant about it, why don’t you be a partner with me on it and we’ll go in together?’
“I said, ‘Done.'”
On Sept. 22, 2000, Jimmie Johnson officially signed with Hendrick Motorsports to drive the No. 48 Chevrolet part-time.
He made his first start behind the wheel of the No. 48 ride less than 13 months after that, signed with the team full-time in 2002 and earned his first Sprint Cup Series race 10 races into his rookie year.
Less than five years after that, Johnson was celebrating his first Sprint Cup Series championship at Homestead-Miami Speedway.
• • •
This weekend at Homestead-Miami Speedway, Johnson has a chance to rewrite history books as he tries for his seventh Sprint Cup title that will put him in the elite seven-championship category with Dale Earnhardt and Richard Petty.
Having fought to make Johnson a part of Hendrick Motorsports, Gordon knew he had the talent, charisma and ability to be great from the beginning.
But he never could have imagined he would be watching him do this.
“I thought that he would do well because I had enough confidence in our equipment and I saw his skills and talent,” Gordon said. “But you pull for a guy like Jimmie when you get to know him because he’s a great guy. He’s an awesome person, he loves racing and he’s good to people. There are certain people out there in the world that when you get to know them, you understand why they’ve been successful and you also can get behind supporting them to have success because you know they’re going to do good things with it. Jimmie’s one of the those guys.
“Certainly, when we were sitting in the sponsor meeting talking to Lowe’s about sponsoring the car, I remember point-blank someone from the CEO asking, ‘Well, Jeff do you think Jimmie can win races and championships?’ And I was like, ‘Absolutely! I’m completely confident.’
“I mean, I wanted the sponsor and I believed in Jimmie,” Gordon said with a chuckle. “but I can’t say that I could have ever foreseen him doing what he’s done.”
One of the great names in racing himself, Gordon has raced with the best of the best, going toe-to-toe with Earnhardt on more than one occasion. But Gordon can’t compare the two great drivers — with the exception of raw talent and drive; they’re just too different, he said.
“I cannot tell you exactly how talented Richard Petty was, how talented Cale Yarborough was or Dale Earnhardt because I never drove their race cars,” Gordon said. “I didn’t drive for that team — and the car and the team have a big influence on it.
“But what I can tell you is that I have driven Jimmie Johnson‘s car and I competed against him side-by-side at Hendrick Motorsports with all the same equipment and opportunities and that’s why I can tell you that he’s the best I’ve ever raced against because I got beat fairly regularly by him and by that team,” Gordon said with a laugh.
• • •
Much has changed for Jimmie Johnson since he entered the sport as a young driver out of California. Gone is the small-team car fighting to make a name for himself in the big leagues of racing. Gone is the uncertainty of a racing career. Gone is the battle for his first win, as he now owns 79 Sprint Cup Series victories.
But still there is the fight and drive to be successful, as he strives for #Se7en on Sunday.
“Things have not been given easy to Jimmie — he’s had to fight for a lot of things,” Gordon said.
“(It’s) incredible really, when you think about it. I go back and think of his five in a row and I thought that was extraordinary and unheard of, and here we are not that much further down the road and he could do seven. So, he has absolutely set a new standard and raised the bar and has had an extraordinary career, regardless of whether he wins seven.”
