Jimmie Johnson, Left) Chad Knaus (Center) and Rick Hendrick (Right) celebrate after winning the NASCAR Banking 500 at Lowe’s Motor Speedway, Oct. 17 2009. (Photo: LAT Photographic)

NASCAR Banking 500, Lowe’s Motor Speedway, Oct. 17: A week after winning at Auto Club Speedway in California, Johnson and crew chief Chad Knaus had the “perfect” weekend at Charlotte. Johnson was fastest in every practice, won the pole, led the most laps and won the race.

“This is a personal goal of mine,” Knaus said. “We were close twice. We had missed it in race practice one time, we had missed it in qualifying practice another time. I kept a tally on that. It's true. We've been close but never quite made it ever, so it's kind of cool.”

Johnson also padded his points lead when contenders Mark Martin,
Juan Pablo Montoyaand Tony Stewart all had trouble. Johnson led Martin by 12, Montoya by 58 and Stewart by 84 before the race – but led Martin by 90, Montoya by 195 and Stewart and 155 after.

“I mean, it's a nice points lead, but there's no need for anybody to get too excited yet,” Johnson said. “We've got good tracks ahead for us, so from a team standpoint we're excited and optimistic, but at the same time there's a lot of danger out there and we've just got to be smart.”

Johnson would be prophetic, for he crashed in the opening laps in the Texas race.

Checker O'Reilly Auto Parts 500, Phoenix International Raceway, Nov. 15: Johnson had built a 184-point lead on Martin by the time the series left Martinsville, but a lot of that went away early at Texas when Johnson crashed and finished 38th.

How did Johnson and Knaus respond? Johnson qualified third, led 238 of the 312 laps and won the Phoenix race.

“I could say from living it, it wasn't necessarily a statement, it was, ‘Hey, guys, we need to step up today and get it done,’” Johnson said. “Chad and I, the conversations we've had, the team meeting, everything was, ‘We need to show what we're made of, we need to get this done today.’

“I guess in the end it could have been a statement that we're sending. But we knew we had to come out today and run well. We knew this was going to be a great track for the 5 [of Martin] and also for the 24 [of Jeff Gordon]. The only way to get any points on 'em would be to lead the most laps and win the race. We did it.

I'm very proud of the fact we looked each other in the eyes, knew what we had to do, and delivered.”

It’s safe to say Johnson delivered numerous times during the 2009 season.

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