Will Jimmie Johnson Keep the Coca-Cola 600 Crown?: For the last three years Jimmie Johnson has won the Coca-Cola 600. In fact, in the last two years no other driver has won a points race at Lowes Motor Speedway. This year the 2006 Coca-Cola 600 features a new track surface, a different tire compound and smaller fuel tanks. Can Jimmie Johnson continue to dominate at Lowes Motor Speedway and win his fourth Coca-Cola 600 in-a-row?
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The Track: Lowes Motor Speedway is a mile and a half tri-oval with 24 degrees of banking in the turns. The track is fast and even though there is a preferred groove there is still enough room for a faster car to get by.
Lowes Motor Speedway is the home track for NASCAR. The majority of the teams are based within 30 miles of the speedway and everybody brings their best stuff to Lowes because everybody wants the bragging rights of winning their home race.
Race Distance: 400 Laps = 600 Miles
The Big Picture: Jimmie Johnson has proven that he is the king of Lowes Motor Speedway. He won the All-Star Challenge last week and has won five of the last six points races held there. If he's still running at the end he likely won't lose his point lead this week.
The current points top ten are:
- Jimmie Johnson -0
- Tony Stewart -93
- Matt Kenseth -94
- Mark Martin -199
- Dale Earnhardt Jr. -226
- Jeff Gordon -295
- Kyle Busch -298
- Kasey Kahne -307
- Kevin Harvick -321
- Jeff Burton -391
Storylines: Last season the Coca-Cola 600 set an all-time NASCAR record for cautions in a race. This year NASCAR and Lowes Motor Speedway made changes to avoid another mess like they had on their hands last year.
Here are the three big changes for the 2006 event:
- Lowes Motor Speedway has been completely repaved
- Goodyear brought an extremely hard tire compound
- NASCAR mandated 14 gallon fuel cells instead of the regular 22 gallons
How will these changes affect the 2006 Coke 600?
Media Coverage: TV: FOX Sunday, May 28th, 5:00PM Eastern.
Radio: PRN and XM Satellite
Actual Race: 5:30PM Eastern
Posted Awards: $6,432,681
Last Year: There were twenty-two yellow flags during this race. Joe Nemechek had a solid lead late in the race but cut a tire and slammed the wall with just eight laps to go to bring out the final caution. This left Bobby Labonte in the lead with Jimmie Johnson closing fast on newer tires.
Johnson got on the outside of Labonte in turn four of the last lap and the two charged back to the line side-by-side. Jimmie Johnson nipped Labonte at the finish line by about three feet.
Predictions: Given his incredible statistics at Lowes Motor Speedway over the last three years. I have to go with Jimmie Johnson to win the 2006 Coca-Cola 600. He's leading the points which proves that he's having a great year and he just won last week at this very race track. This is the single most obvious pick of the entire 2006 NASCAR NEXTEL Cup season.
Since my top pick was way too easy I'm going to dig up a somewhat unusual choice for my backup. The Coca-Cola 600 has seen some rookie winners in the past. I believe that Denny Hamlin could be a great pick for this weekend. The kid is extremely fast and his Joe Gibbs team is capable of getting the job done.
