Johnson's crash in Texas opens up Chase for remaining two races

Those Jimmie Johnson voodoo dolls worked perfectly this weekend for the anti-J.J. faction which wants to see the quest for a fourth straight championship derailed.

Crew members work on Jimmie Johnson's car in the garage for about one hour. (Getty Images)

Seemingly on cruise control, Johnson's run to title No. 4 hit a serious speed bump in Sunday's Dickies 500 when he was caught up in a lap three crash and limped home to a 38th place finish.

And just like that the Chase for the Sprint Cup championship race tightened up with Johnson's lead shaved by 111 points in one fell swoop.

"As we saw today, anything can happen," said Johnson, who has been preaching that mantra the last few weeks despite most of the world being ready to hand him the title.

"It's not as bad as it could have been. We could have been 43rd. At one point Chad told me to hop out of the car, it was done, we're going to have to put it on the truck. They were able to get it fixed. Mark didn't win. There were a couple small things that helped us in the end. It's still a big ouch."

An ouch as in a 184-point advantage down to just 73 over his teammate Mark Martin.

Johnson seemed to take a little pride in being right at his own expense as he faced the media after Sunday's race in Texas. All along he's continued to harp on the fact that anything could happen before the final checkered flag of the season flies in Homestead at the end of the month.

Sunday it did.

"It could have been considered lip service if everything went great this weekend," he said. "A lot of people predicted, like we had hoped. In the back of my mind, I couldn't shut down the possibility of something going wrong. This is racing. You got to drive the race. We've heard it from other sports: You have to play the game."

Now remarkably Martin is back in the game, one he hasn't wanted to play all year long and despite the bite he took out of Johnson's lead Sunday is not about to jump into now.

The veteran's fourth place finish at Texas, while steady, coupled with Johnson's misfortunes, still doesn't give Martin any more of a sense he can overtake the three-time champ for the title than it did before Sunday's chain of events.

"It didn't feel as good when I knew we didn't have a chance," Martin said of his chances to win the championship. "It's still a long shot because they have great performance. We can't go outperform them seventy-some points but racing's not over with yet. Jeff Gordon is breathing down my neck, Tony Stewart. We'll have to see what happens here."

Indeed Johnson's poor finish brought the entire Chase field a bit closer. While Martin was the biggest beneficiary, Gordon and race winner Kurt Busch also closed in on the lead. So Martin remains as focused on his windshield as he does his rear view mirror.

"I've still got my hands full for the top six positions with all those guys," Martin said. "Two guys that have knocked me out of championships [Stewart and Gordon] are still breathing down my neck. So the race is still on, man. I don't know why everybody tries to count this thing out and doesn't just wait and watch. There's still two races to go and still things can happen."

Johnson can certainly attest to that. He's come short of saying 'I told you so' after Sunday's disappointment but couldn't hold back a knowing look as he assessed the day's events.

"I guess there is some of that in there," he said. "It's really not for me to sit here and say that. I just think it's a good lesson for everybody. We'll learn a lot as a race team from this. I think the media side, as well, you have a much better understanding why Chad and I have been so nervous. Even after winning races, fielding questions, the possibility was out there. It's still out there. There's no telling what's gonna happen."

Even race winner Kurt Busch, who suddenly finds himself in fourth in the standings 171 points out of the lead, agrees with the unpredictable nature of the championship race.

"Who knows. I mean, we race the races," Busch said. "That's why we do it. We don't do it off paper. We go challenge ourselves to be the best at Phoenix and challenge ourselves to be the best at Homestead in two weeks to try to see how we can move up in points. We don't wish any bad luck upon anybody else. I have a great car owner, great crew chief by my side, great engineering staff. We're doing what we can to put ourselves in position."

Johnson still has the most coveted position as he remains on top of the standings heading into next week's trip to Phoenix.

At the very least he can find some consolation in knowing it's still his championship to lose.

"We're still in a great position," he said. "Like I said, we'll dust ourselves off. There's really not much we can do, reflect back on this, say it was a bad car, a bad pit stop or something I did wrong. We were just in the wrong place at the wrong time."

"So it was just one of those things. We'll go to Phoenix."