The NASCAR road show moved down to Homestead International Speedway for the final event of the Chase series and the final event of the 2013 NASCAR season.
The 1.5 mile oval track at Homestead is one of the fastest on the circuit and over 65,000 race fans were on hand for the big event.
Going into the final race, Jimmie Johnson in the #48 Lowe’s Chevrolet held onto a 28 point lead which most saw as insurmountable. So much so in fact that the big sports books in Nevada took Johnson’s odds to win off the board. As of last week, Johnson was posted as a 1-to-5 favorite to win his next Sprint Cup Championship.
Basically, Jimmie only had to finish 24th or better in the Ford EcoBoost 400 to cruise into yet another Sprint Cup Championship. If the 48 wrecks or experiences some sort of mechanical breakdown, Matt Kenseth was waiting in the wings. However, in the previous 9 races this season, Johnson has finished no worse than 13th in any of them.
Give Kenseth credit for hanging in there. He went out and won the pole position at Homestead just to show them that he’s still got it. Jimmie Johnson qualified in 7th position for the start of the race but his history at Homestead is not all that great. He finished 32nd in 2011 and 36th in 2012. So, you never know.
As the saying goes in NASCAR circles, ‘What goes around, comes around’ or is it ‘What comes around, goes around’? I don’t think it really matters. Matt Kenseth will be going both ways trying once again to capture the Cup. He almost caught Brad Keselowski last year… almost.
But this is still NASCAR and a whole world of things can go wrong out there on the track for any of the drivers. A tire could blow. A rookie driver could lose control and slide over into you. A $5 part can fail and stop the entire show.
After the qualifying round Jimmie Johnson told reporters, “It’s not bad. Life is good… It’s been a comfortable day. Everything has been pretty calm and good.” Since we are talking NASCAR here, Jimmie is definitely talking about the calm before the storm.
In the end it was Denny Hamlin who won the final race of the season with Matt Kenseth taking second after leading the pack for 144 of the 267 laps. Jimmie Johnson came in 9th and secured the Sprint Cup Championship for 2013.
