Monday, March 14, 2005 | 11:32 a.m.
Jimmie Johnson played the role of rude guest Sunday afternoon and spoiled a potential 1-2 finish by Las Vegas natives Kyle and Kurt Busch in the UAW-DaimlerChrysler 400 NASCAR Nextel Cup Series race at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
Johnson took the lead from Ryan Newman with 54 laps remaining and held off Hendrick Motorsports teammate and rookie Kyle Busch for his 15th career Cup victory. Defending series champion Kurt Busch took third for his best finish in five starts on his hometown track.
Johnson, who took over the points lead from Kurt Busch after three races, said the victory was a nice morale booster in light of the rash of problems suffered by drivers using Hendrick Motorsports-supplied engines two weeks ago at California Speedway -- although Johnson's car was not affected as he finished second.
"It's nice to get off to a good start," said Johnson, who finished 8 points behind Kurt Busch in the championship last season. "We made some changes (on the team) over the offseason ... and I don't think we took a step back this year, I think we maintained if not made a step ahead from where we were last year -- that's great to have."
Johnson's 15-point lead, however, could be short-lived. During postrace inspection, the roof measurement on his No. 48 Chevrolet was too low and NASCAR likely will penalize Johnson and his team on Tuesday; the penalties could include a loss of championship points.
Kyle Busch's No. 5 Chevrolet also failed the postrace inspection due to a rear quarterpanel measurement that was too high and he and his team also face possible penalties.
The victory, before a sellout crowd estimated at 156,000, was Johnson's fifth in the past nine races dating to last season.
Despite an ill-handling car in the early portions of the race, Johnson continued his torrid start to the 2005 season that has seen him post finishes of fifth, second and first in the opening three races.
"In the beginning of the race ... I was really loose and I think by the first pit stop, I was in 20th," Johnson said. "We just had to keep working on the racecar. I was very good on the short runs but as the run went on, I'd get looser and looser. We finally found something that started to work and once we did that, I just was railing through the pack.
"Ryan (Newman) and I, at the end when we had our cars just right, I knew I needed to get by Ryan and I had to really work hard to get by him. I think we put on a great show (when we were) running side by side for a long time. We were the best when we needed to be, and that was at the end of the race."
The same could be said for Kyle and Kurt Busch. Both drivers struggled with their cars before getting them right for the final 39-lap green-flag run.
"It was fun today," Kyle Busch said. "I didn't think we had a good enough car to finish here, but we did. We had an awesome car there at the end. We were kind of struggling all day with a tight car and (we were) able to come back here at the end and have a decent car where we could pass guys on the outside and get up to second position."
Busch, 19, was sixth on the final restart and moved into second place in five laps. Johnson managed to keep a comfortable lead on his teammate until encountering lapped traffic with 15 laps remaining. Busch cut Johnson's lead in half, to three-quarters of a second, but Johnson got past the backmarkers and stretched his led to 1.6 seconds at the checkered flag.
"We might have been able to catch (Johnson) if we had another caution there, but that would have also given everybody else a chance to adjust on their cars," Kyle Busch said. "If Jimmie and I could have come down pit road by ourselves and put another set of tires on, I think we (would have) had a shot to chase him down.
"We were running the exact same lap times. He'd be quicker than me, I'd be quicker than him and we'd kind of even out. If we had a little more adjustment time, we probably could have got him."
Johnson said he had one thought when he saw his young teammate pull into second place.
"Run," Johnson said with a laugh. "He's hungry, he's at his home track (and) he's in the same equipment I'm sitting in. I just did everything I could to stay in front of him. I really worked hard to get a cushion in front of him so that if I ran into lapped traffic and had some problems, then I had a little space to give up or to play with there.
"He did a great job."
Kyle's older brother Kurt Busch seemed happy with his second consecutive third-place finish after he, too, battled a variety of handling issues throughout the first two-thirds of the race.
"We did better than I thought we could do today," Kurt Busch said. "It was an awesome effort for our Sharpie Ford. With the competitive advantage that the Roush (Racing) guys have seemed to have had here at this track, we just didn't quite slide into Victory Lane like we thought.
"But it was a super effort. We had to overcome a bad pit stop that put us in the back, but we were able to charge our way back to the front. I wish we could have picked up the (win) for the hometown crowd, but there's a great group of people out there -- probably 150,000 strong -- that saw a great race today."
Sunday's race featured an event-record 10 caution periods for 46 laps, which helped produce 25 lead changes among 12 drivers. Johnson led five times for a race-high 107 laps.
Daytona 500 winner Jeff Gordon took fourth and Kevin Harvick, who started 42nd after his fourth-fastest qualifying time on Friday was disallowed for a rules violation, was fifth. Greg Biffle, Casey Mears, Matt Kenseth, Newman and Tony Stewart rounded out the top 10.
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