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Jimmie Johnson can’t quite clinch another championship in Sunday’s NASCAR Sprint Cup race at Texas Motor Speedway, but he certainly can make the title chase more compelling.
With only three races left in the season, starting with the Dickies 500 at the 1.5-mile TMS oval, Johnson has a comfortable 183-point lead in the Cup standings over Carl Edwards.
If Johnson merely keeps his No. 48 Chevrolet near the front, he’ll probably waltz toward his third consecutive title in the final two races at Phoenix and Homestead-Miami.
But if Johnson runs into Texas-size trouble here, that could tighten NASCAR’s Chase for the Cup playoff and give Edwards and third-place Greg Biffle (185 points back) a fighting chance.
“At this point it’s pretty much all or nothing,” Edwards said. “If we can catch Jimmie on a day where he has some trouble . . . we have to be there getting the most amount of points.”
Johnson, meanwhile, has the highest average finish (8.5) and he’s the defending champion of the Dickies 500. Texas was part of his remarkable title run last year, when he won four of the final five races.
And he has no intention of playing it safe at this point.
“Until I have that trophy, in my mind I can’t loosen up on things,” he said after storming through the field late in the race to finish second to Edwards at Atlanta. “I just got to keep my head down and keep working for this.”
