Jimmie Johnson uses last-lap pass to win third straight Coca-Cola 600 | 40 wins in 40 days

Editor’s note: This is the 17th in a 40-part series highlighting 40 of the greatest wins in the history of Hendrick Motorsports to finish its 40th anniversary season. A new installment will be released each day from Nov. 22, 2024 through New Year’s Eve. Votes were taken from Hendrick Motorsports employees as well as representatives of the NASCAR Hall of Fame and Racing Insights with all unanimous selections being ushered in automatically. The remaining wins were deliberated and decided upon by a small panel. 

CONCORD, N.C. - Theres’s an old saying, “Home is where the heart is.”

For the NASCAR community, that place is Charlotte, North Carolina – home of the NASCAR Hall of Fame, most of its race teams, support and infrastructure. And of course, there’s Charlotte Motor Speedway, the area’s historic tri-oval that opened in 1960 and site for one of the sport’s crown jewel races – the Coca-Cola 600.

The area is also home to Rick Hendrick, owner of Hendrick Motorsports and chairman/CEO of Hendrick Automotive Group, whose flagship dealership, City Chevrolet, is just a few minutes down the road from the race shop. While born and raised in southern Virginia, the “Queen City” has become very meaningful for Hendrick and his family.

“There’s photographs of Mr. Hendrick with his very first race car, it was a white, City Chevrolet car, in the infield of Charlotte Motor Speedway,” said Chad Knaus, current vice president of competition for Hendrick Motorsports and former crew chief. “That track has always been really important to Mr. Hendrick.”

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It could also be argued that the Coca-Cola 600 first put Jimmie Johnson and Knaus on the proverbial map. Johnson’s two NASCAR Cup Series championship runner-up finishes in 2003 and 2004 were both springboarded by 600 victories, including the team’s overwhelming 2004 effort that saw Johnson lead 334 of the race’s 400 laps.

By 2005, the duo had helped establish the 48 as the clear team to beat at the 1.5-mile facility.

“It was a style of track that fit me,” Johnson said. “And there are certainly plenty of statistics that say it fit Hendrick Motorsports as well. Also, you can’t ignore the fit with Chad Knaus and that turned into an amazing combination for us."

From a business perspective, it was also important for the team. Both Charlotte Motor Speedway - then called Lowe's Motor Speedway - and Johnson’s Hendrick Motorsports operation carried sponsorship from Lowe’s Home Improvement, headquartered about 30 miles north of the track in Mooresville, North Carolina.

“Obviously with the Lowe’s partnership and them being the primary sponsor of that facility, it was a big deal,” Knaus added. “So, we always went over there and wanted to do well.”

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Anytime NASCAR races in Charlotte, it’s a big deal for everyone involved.

While recent history favored the team and its quest for a third-consecutive Coca-Cola 600, victory would be difficult. In the spring of 2005, Lowe’s Motor Speedway officials had levigated the worn asphalt, grinding down some of the surface bumps and changing its overall character.

Johnson and his Hendrick Motorsports teammates Jeff Gordon, Kyle Busch and Brian Vickers were strong throughout practice and qualifying, but track conditions were more unpredictable than ever, and race day had come quickly for teams that were scrambling.

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Ryan Newman qualified on the pole with Gordon on the outside of the front row, while Johnson started fifth. The race got off to a clean start and Johnson immediately moved into the top four.

Lap seven saw the first caution when Martin Truex, Jr., tagged the outside wall in turn two. Moments later, defending Cup Series champion Kurt Busch also found himself in the wall in the same corner. It was the beginning of a familiar tune that would last throughout the afternoon and evening as there were a record 22 caution periods, still the most in race history.

Approaching the halfway point, Johnson sat just outside the top 10 and was struggling. Knaus relayed to Fox pit road reporter, Dick Berggren, that the car was deficient on the exit of turn four.

And, according to Knaus in a recent interview with HendrickMotorsports.com, the team had even bigger problems.

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“We had a really fast car and unfortunately, we actually had an alternator go out midway through the event and had to change batteries,” Knaus said. “We came in, diagnosed the issue, went to the back, drove up back toward the front, came in on the next caution and changed batteries, went to the rear again and didn’t lose a lap, which was awesome. The guys did a great job. And then, we were able to charge back up there."

Johnson hung around the top half of the field throughout the latter portions of NASCAR’s longest race, making numerous restarts and staying quite competitive even as caution flags mounted. Still, prospects for a third-consecutive win seemed like a long-shot at best.

That is until lap 380. Gordon, Vickers, Kevin Harvick, Mark Martin and Bill Elliott were involved in a massive melee in turn one, hobbling or ending the night for many of the race’s top contenders. Vickers had led the most laps at 98, while Gordon wasn’t far behind with 49.

The complexion of the race had changed, opening the door for the 48 crew.

The race’s last caution came on lap 392 when Joe Nemechek and Scott Wimmer got together in turn four.

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Johnson sat fourth on the final restart but made short order of Newman and Carl Edwards before that opening lap was complete. With two laps to go and a heady Bobby Labonte out front, Johnson was in rapid pursuit and closing. Coming across start-finish to take the white flag, Johnson grew impatient and dove under Labonte heading into turn one.

Having lost momentum trying to pass low, Johnson needed to quickly regather to make one-last push. Entering turn three, the 48 went to the high side, carrying momentum. Buoyed by his elite car control, Johnson made a move for the ages, riding the outside wall and inching past Labonte coming out of corner – overcoming an entire day’s worth turn four struggles in that one moment.

Johnson crossed the stripe a mere .027 of a second ahead of Labonte, still the closest finish in Coca-Cola 600 history.

It was redemption from earlier in the year, and another step towards building the mentality needed to win the first of his seven NASCAR Cup Series championships – which would come the following season in 2006.

“I lost one earlier this year to Carl Edwards that way,” Johnson told Berggren in victory lane. “I knew if I could get to Bobby’s quarter and have his spotter say, ‘outside,’ I would have the momentum back to the start-finish line. I got a little impatient when we took the white (flag), I made a bonsai pass underneath him in one and two and lost a bunch of momentum and got sideways – I thought I had lost it. I went into turn three a little mad and determined. Made it stick around the outside and made it back to the start-finish line. This is a very, very special win today.”

Ironically, the usually confident Knaus went into those closing laps with quite a bit doubt.

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“My biggest memory of this one is, Bobby Turner, who works with our military group right now, he was one of our engineers,” Knaus said. “I was pretty frustrated and sad that we were going to lose that race because of a battery issue. And Bobby said to me, ‘Man, don’t give up, you don’t know, we still have a shot to win this thing.’ And I can remember telling him, ‘Just shut the hell up, you don’t know what you’re talking about.’ And then as we rolled through there and passed Bobby (Labonte) on the last lap, it was pretty awesome.”

For Johnson, he was philosophical about what transpired, thankful to be in position to make that final pass in front of a very important audience.

“If you’re going to pick a track to be good at, you want it to be your sponsor’s track. It’s just one of those moments in time that all the stars aligned for us,” Johnson said. “It just puts a huge smile on the faces of the staff and the individuals from Lowe’s and all of the board members."

In 2014, Johnson placed himself in rare company by winning a fourth Coca-Cola 600, which currently ranks second all time for the prestigious event. NASCAR hall of famer Darrell Waltrip still leads the way with five race victories, including the first two for Hendrick Motorsports in 1988 and 1989. Currently, Hendrick Motorsports boasts 12 Coca-Cola 600 victories, the most of any NASCAR Cup Series team. Along with Waltrip and Johnson, Gordon (1994, 1997, 1998), Casey Mears (2007), Kasey Kahne (2012) and Kyle Larson (2021) have all scored wins in the crown jewel event.

Overall, Johnson captured eight of Hendrick Motorsports’ 21 points-paying victories at Charlotte Motor Speedway, adding four wins there in the All-Star Race as well.