As Jimmie Johnson chases title No. 7, he's not motivated by the number
KANSAS CITY, Kan. – Jimmie Johnson's next championship will be his seventh.
As many NASCAR fans know, a seventh title will tie Johnson, who turned 40 on Thursday, with Richard Petty and Dale Earnhardt for the most Sprint Cup titles of any driver. And given that Johnson has no plans on ending his driving career soon – he said the two-year extension he recently signed won't be his last one – it's reasonable to think that the driver of the No. 48 will surpass Earnhardt and Petty before his career is over.
While Johnson admits that tying the two most iconic drivers in NASCAR history is cool, he said he's able to separate the internal drive for another championship from the fact that his next title would be such a significant one.
"What motivates me at night … where my drive comes from, it isn’t to tie Dale and Richard. It’s to win a championship," Johnson told Yahoo Sports while doing a driver appearance in Kansas City earlier in the week. "I’m not motivated by the number. Absolutely would love it. There’s so much upside that comes with it, let’s be honest. But it’s not what deeply motivates me. It’s about performing.
"Now having a family, I’m somebody that’s driven and need to accomplish things and be me to feel like I need to and want to. So to leave the house and to spend as much time as I do away from my family, I want to perform. I want to have success and take trophies home."
Johnson has four victories in 2015. He's starting the Chase as the co-top seed with Kyle Busch, who also has four wins. But Johnson's last win came 13 races ago, or the last race of the first half of the regular season. One could make the argument that Johnson and his Hendrick teammates have been passed up by the Joe Gibbs Racing and Team Penske cars.
But you can counter that pretty easily too. Johnson and crew chief Chad Knaus have those six titles together. Knaus is one of the most purposeful and analytical crew chiefs in the garage. And Johnson is really, really, really good at the tracks that host the Chase's 10 races.
Plus, Johnson may not have as much pressure on himself than he once had. He said that when his team was eliminated from title contention in 2011, breaking a five-year title streak, he could feel the release of all the tension that had built up to keep the streak alive. The lack of pressure could be freeing, especially as the No. 48 team has learned from the first year of the Chase's elimination format.
"[2011] when it shut down and we were eliminated – I think in Phoenix from championship hopes mathematically – I didn’t realize the weight that was on my shoulders and the burden to keep that streak alive and what that did to me, my team, the way it affected my family life and life in general.
So the weeks following that was just like 'Wow, i didn’t realize I had that much pressure on myself.’ Learned from that. We didn’t have a great [2011] season and definitely a tough pill to swallow. [2012] we were competitive but [2013] when it all came around, that’s truthfully the most fun I’ve had in any year driving at the Cup level. We had fast cars, we won a lot, we had fun, the pressure wasn’t there to keep the streak alive, the pressure wasn’t there to win my first … It was just like ‘let’s go and win a championship or try and win a championship.'"
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Nick Bromberg is the editor of From The Marbles on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at nickbromberg@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter!
