Johnson wins for 5th time in Texas

Johnson was too much for Harvick on this Saturday night

Jimmie Johnson's No. 48 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet was the strongest it had been all night when it counted the most – at the end of Saturday night's Duck Commander 500 at Texas Motor Speedway.

It was a battle between defending NASCAR Sprint Cup Series champion Kevin Harvick and six-time champion Johnson for much of the season's first night race. And Harvick got back into his groove of first- or second-place finishes. He has finished in the top 2 in nine of 10 races dating back to the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup race at Texas, with the exception being last week at Martinsville, where he finished eighth.

Falling temperatures as night descended on Texas Motor Speedway challenged all of the leaders as Harvick, Johnson, Kurt Busch and Brad Keselowski fought their cars' setups and each other for the lead throughout the evening.

Harvick scraped the wall on the next-to-last lap, but managed to hold off a hard-charging Dale Earnhardt Jr., who finished third in the Duck Commander 500. Joey Logano and Brad Keselowski rounded out the top five.

This was Johnson’s 72nd career victory, and second of the 2015 season. His first win of the year came at Atlanta Motor Speedway. It was Harvick’s 13th top-10 finish and Earnhardt Jr.’s 15th top-10 finish at Texas Motor Speedway.

"Chad (Knaus, crew chief) and the crew made the right adjustments and a great call for four tires on the last stop," said Jim Campbell, U.S. Vice President, Performance Vehicles and Motorsports. "Jimmie drove great all night with a really strong run after the last pit stop and put the No. 48 Chevy SS in Winners Circle." “I’m really excited to have Team Chevy drivers Jimmie Johnson, Kevin Harvick and Dale Earnhardt Jr. finish 1-2-3 at Texas Motor Speedway."

JIMMIE JOHNSON, NO. 48 LOWE’S PRO SERVICES CHEVROLET SS – WINNER

[adinserter name="GOOGLE AD"]FROM THE RECOVERY ON PIT ROAD, THIS WAS DEFINITELY A WORK IN PROGRESS:
Yeah it was. Forgive me because my voice has been gone all day and I woke up with a cold but just a great, great race car. I just want to give a shout out to all the pros that shop at Lowe’s and to the folks at Lowe’s Pro Services, to Chevrolet, Hendrick Motorsports and Valvoline because we have had an awesome, awesome start to the year. The end results don’t show it but the great support from our fans, our sponsors…..Gatorade as well and Kobalt Tools. We just kept plugging at it and I think the off-week was good for us to sit down and relax, reboot and come back to the track and they brought me a fast race car that was good all weekend.

WERE YOU EVER CONCERNED THAT YOU WERE GOING TO GET THIS CAR BACK OUT FRONT?
I thought we were in big trouble once we restarted. The No. 4 (Kevin Harvick) went up through there and got to the lead. I just couldn’t go anywhere. I got so tight. We weren’t sure if it was a bad set of tires. We felt like we had a set that didn’t match up with us earlier in the race. So, we made no adjustments. We went out the next restart and the car was a little better, but made an adjustment. Then that last pit stop we made the right adjustment. I caught the No. 4 (Harvick) racing with the No. 1 (Jamie McMurray). I was able to get by both of those guys and check out. It was an exciting race. I hope the fans really enjoyed that one.

TALK ABOUT RACING WITH THE NO. 4 AND NO. 88:
Yeah the No. 88 (Dale Earnhardt, Jr.) was making the bottom work, so I was trying to make that happen. The No. 4 (Harvick) all of a sudden was in second and coming hard on the top. So, I moved up top to try and make that work and I looked in the mirror off to (Turn) 2 and I saw the No. 4 in the wall. I figured that was the end of him and then he and the No. 88 (Earnhardt, Jr.) raced each other so hard at the end. Just good fun. I think that the No. 88, the No. 4 all of us that were involved in that there at the end just had a blast. That is how racing should be and I’m so happy the fans got to see that.

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