Johnson Wraps Up Cup Title

Jimmie Johnson celebrates his first Nextel Cup championship. "It's everything I ever wanted to be," he said. "This means the world to me." (Hans Deryk - Reuters)

HOMESTEAD, Fla., Nov. 19 -- He rubbed fenders with Kevin Harvick, narrowly missed three wrecks and fell to 40th after a piece of debris impaled his Chevrolet's front grill. But neither rough driving nor bad luck derailed Jimmie Johnson's bid for NASCAR's Nextel Cup championship Sunday, as the two-time runner-up finally won the title he has flirted with for the last five years.

Johnson's ninth-place finish in NASCAR's Ford 400 was good enough to clinch the championship given the 63-point lead he carried into stock-car racing's season finale. And Johnson, 31, who has been so poised throughout NASCAR's tense postseason, reacted by thanking his pit crew profusely over the radio the moment he zoomed across the finish line at Homestead-Miami Speedway and then erupting into ear-splitting shrieks of joy.

"It's everything I ever wanted to be!" said Johnson, a native of El Cajon, Calif. "This means the world to me."

Matt Kenseth, NASCAR's 2003 champion, finished second in NASCAR's Chase for the Nextel Cup with his sixth-place finish Sunday.

Greg Biffle, who wasn't eligible for NASCAR's postseason, won the season finale for the third consecutive year, with Martin Truex Jr. surging to a second-place finish, followed by rookie Denny Hamlin.

Hamlin's performance helped him move up to third in the season's final standings -- a huge achievement for a first-year driver. Kevin Harvick and Dale Earnhardt Jr. rounded out the top five in the final standings.

While Johnson isn't a favorite among NASCAR's old-school fans, who thrive on booing both him and Jeff Gordon (his Hendrick Motorsports teammate and co-owner), he's well liked and respected among his peers, who have watched him learn the rough art of stock-car racing with humility and resolve since giving up off-road racing in the California desert for the chance to battle in full-bodied sedans.

"He's raced hard for a lot of years getting ready for this," said Jack Roush, owner of Kenseth's Ford.

And there was no end to the people he wanted to thank after realizing his dream -- his race team's sponsor, Lowe's; his car owner Rick Hendrick; the crew members who changed his tires and filled his gas tanks; drivers Tony Stewart, Brian Vickers and Casey Mears, who offered advice and good humor in recent days; and his wife, who endured his neurosis down the stretch.

"I have punished her these last weeks with my emotions and stress," Johnson said. "I love her dearly."

Johnson's championship is the sixth for Hendrick Motorsports and the team's first since 2001, when Gordon won his fourth. Johnson becomes the team's third driver to win NASCAR's most prestigious title, joining Gordon and Terry Labonte.

And his title represents a measure of healing for an organization that has known as much tragedy as it has success. Hendrick learned he had leukemia 10 years ago this week and recovered after a long battle with the illness. Then, in October 2004, he lost his only son, brother and eight other members of his family and race operation when a plane carrying them to a NASCAR race in Martinsville, Va., crashed on a mountainside nearby.