Is Jimmie Johnson for real? Maybe he should be wearing a red cape. On Sunday, at least, he appeared to come out of a phone booth somewhere near the Auto Club Speedway during overtime to take his 77th career Sprint Cup victory.
Heading toward a fifth-place or sixth-place finish before the overtime, Johnson used a bump-and-blow-by to pass Kevin Harvick and the legend of Dale Earnhardt Sr. on the final re-start. Far shy of former teammate and mentor Jeff Gordon's 93 career victories, is there any more that the Sprint Cup's first two-time winner of the year can do after a victory in a car sponsored by the current Superman movie?
Actually, the seventh championship watch began the moment Johnson cleared Harvick's Chevy coming through Turn 2. After bump-drafting Harvick into the lead, he slipped past the race's dominant car and it was all over except for musings about the possibilities at season's end. Meanwhile, he broke the tie for career victories with Earnhardt Sr.
"Man, this is cool," said Johnson, who donned a red cape in victory lane. "I knew we had great car and that caution fell at a bad time the run before. I just didn't have the tires on the car to race with those guys."
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That changed with a trip down the pit road, where his crew vaulted the Superman car into third place.
"I got a great run off of Turn 2 and I thought, 'Man I've got a shot at this thing,' which I didn't expect to have," Johnson said. "Harvick had been so fast. I cleared him and kind of got away. We saved our best for last for sure. We need to keep doing this all year long, especially late in the season."
Now that he's a lock for the Chase with two victories, six-time champion Johnson can focus on another title, which would tie Johnson with the Dark Knight and The King later this year, i.e. Earnhardt Sr. and Richard Petty.
Crew chief Chad Knaus is already looking past this summer to the start of the Chase in September. He is not even concerned about jinxing his Hendrick Motorsports squad, which has had its share of ups and downs during some recent summer doldrums.
"That's obviously been the Achilles' heel of the 48 car going through the summer months," said Knaus, who like his driver has 77 career victories. "Years where it's great, it's fantastic. Years where it's bad, oh, my gosh, you want to slit your wrists."
But Knaus is already thinking autumn. He said he's not going to worry about the heat of June, July and August and instead will focus on turning up the heat once the Chase begins.
"What we're going to do, we're going to focus forward, put our efforts into going into Chicago, New Hampshire, those first few races of the Chase," Knaus said. "That's our main focus at this point.
"We want to perform well, win as many races as we possibly can. This provides an opportunity for us to go out there and be aggressive, do things that might be a bit uncharacteristic, un-normal."
Thus far Johnson has been un-normal -- or maybe even paranormal -- under the new low downforce rules. It pays to remember that Johnson's record-setting string of five straight championships got a boost from the switch to the Car of Tomorrow, which he mastered better than his competitors.
Given that Johnson likes "driving sideways" with a car slightly loose at the rear, the new low downforce package seems tailor-made for his skills.
"When you take the downforce off the car, it's not stuck as well or as deep in the track," said the driver who grew up in nearby El Cajon, Calif., and started his career on always skittish dirt bikes. "The car has a lot of movement and sliding. For me, with my background, I love that. I grew up racing on the dirt, and I love to slide around."
The Fontana, Calif. track has always lent itself to multiple grooves and four-wheel drifts in its wide open, moderately banked, high-speed corners. Johnson has now won on the 2.0-mile track six times, matching his championship tally, in part because it suits his driving style.
Auto Club Speedway was not as hospitable for some other drivers. The new low downforce package's first exhibition on a 2.0-mile track resulted in another close finish but some close quarters as well.
Martin Truex, Jr., who led 21 laps, was hacked off after getting rammed by Joey Logano. Danica Patrick was peeved when her clean pass of Kasey Kahne resulted in getting chased down the banking and turned into the wall.
Where was the caped crusader in the face of such injustices? On this day, Johnson was preparing to do battle with Harvick and Logano for the victory. Starting behind Harvick on the inside of the front row, where Logano's Ford was on the outside, Johnson bumped Harvick's Chevy past Logano, then ducked under the Chevy driver in Turn 1.
Harvick, who led 141 of 200 laps, was philosophical. After all, it's not every day that you get beat by the Man of Steel.
"That was the worst (our car) has taken off on restarts, but we weren't very good on restarts for four or five laps unless we were all by ourselves," Harvick said . "The No. 48 (of Johnson) was able to hang with us, and we just weren't able to drive it in like I needed to, just didn't have the front tires turning and the back wouldn't grip. Still, a good day for us."
And where was Batman?
Dale Earnhardt Jr., who carried the Batman regalia as part of the promotion of the latest action hero movie from Warner Brothers, had a so-so day and finished 11th. But he, too, is thinking of a championship -- possibly a return bout between Superman and Batman.
"I'm not going to be surprised," Earnhardt Jr. said, "if he matches Daddy and Richard (Petty) in that championship deal if we can't get it."
