The combination of the win by Edwards and a 15th-place finish by Johnson in Sunday’s Dickies 500 at Texas Motor Speedway moved the race winner within 106 points of NASCAR Sprint Cup points leader Johnson with just two races remaining.
Although Edwards dominated most of the race, leading 199 of the first 264 laps on the 1.5-mile oval, it was a daring call by crew chief Bob Osborne that got Edwards this win after several other drivers used two-tire strategies to get ahead of him near the finish.
“I thought Bob made a mistake on the four-tire change,” Edwards said. “But Bob came up with a way to win that thing anyway.”
Even before he got out of his car, Edwards, who began the day a daunting 183 points behind Johnson in the Chase for the championship, asked Osborne on the radio: “Hey, where did Jimmie Johnson finish?”
If he continues at that pace for the next two weeks, Edwards will gain his first Sprint Cup championship rather than Johnson winning his third in a row.
“I didn’t expect to be able to close that many points on Jimmie without him having some sort of catastrophic problem,” Edwards said. “So I think that’s a good shot in the arm to all the guys who have been working so hard at the shop and here at the track ... that we can go out and perform well enough to win this thing.”
Jamie McMurray ran third, after giving up the lead for a gas-and-go on Lap 321 of the 334-lap race. Clint Bowyer was fourth, followed by Greg Biffle. Kyle Busch, Kevin Harvick, Martin Truex Jr., Matt Kenseth and David Reutimann rounded out the top 10.
Asked about Edwards gambling on running the final 69 laps without pitting, Johnson said, “I don’t know all the details yet. But, from where I’m sitting, they had a good chance to make up points on us, they didn’t have to win the race.
“I feel that they knew they were going to make it,” he added. “When they started that last run, I really expected the 99 to fly through the pack and end up in the lead in a short period of time. It just took them a long time to get going, I thought, ‘Well, maybe his car isn’t working right. But, I believe in the end they were saving fuel, they were playing that card and if it worked, great, if not, they still were going to gain a bunch of points on us.”
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