- Congratulations to Jimmie Johnson on winning his fourth straight championship and achieving what no man has before. If Jimmie continues at his current pace, I wouldn't be surprised to see him win a fifth one or maybe even a tenth one. It's just a matter of whether any other driver can ever be good enough to stop him. Whether we like it or not, on Sunday we witnessed history; history that we can tell our kids and grandkids about years down the road. For all of you Johnson haters, I have come up with a solution to make all of this a little more bearable: instead of saying Jimmie is the first driver to win four straight championships, you can say he is the first driver to win four straight championships under the Chase format...
- Also, congratulations to Denny Hamlin on becoming the first Toyota driver to ever win at Homestead. An honor a little less remarkable, but it will still go a long way in the foreign record books. Hamlin is a driver who has the potential to dethrone Johnson, but first he needs to figure out how to not throw his whole season away in the first couple races of the Chase. Ten weeks ago at Richmond, I considered him a driver to watch for. A few weeks later he was pretty much out of contention...
- The history doesn't stop after the first two bullets. Jimmie Johnson, Mark Martin, and Jeff Gordon became the first threesome from the same team to finish one-two-three in the year end standings. Hendrick Motorsports is just dominant; that's all there is to say about them. This whole season they have been a couple of steps ahead of everyone else...
- Mark Martin may have come up short of what he was after, but he still has a lot to be proud of. At the beginning of the year, a lot of us kind of considered 2009 his farewell tour. Five wins and 36 races later, I don't know of anyone who doesn't immediately categorize him as a threat for next year's championship. He may be a legitimate contender next year, but I still think that this season was the closest Mark is ever going to get to achieving his long sought goal...
- The most interesting storyline in this year's Chase was the feud between Tony Stewart and Juan Pablo Montoya this week down in the Florida Everglades. Two hot headed drivers were ready to take all of their pent up anger out on each other after a long season. It started with a little nudge, escalated into a cut right front tire, and from then on was a matter of who could crash the other one first. Probably the best fight we have had all year...
- One team dominating always means that there are many others who are left at the end of the season groaning over nothing to brag about. It amazes me that a team like Richard Childress Racing with four drivers didn't visit victory lane once all year. Their drivers may have had some good performances like Jeff Burton and Kevin Harvick did this week, but the organization as a whole has been out of sync for some reason. Was their four team expansion some kind of curse???
- Roush-Fenway Racing was another team left in the dust by HMS. Other than Matt Kenseth winning the first two races of the season and a Jamie McMurray victory at Talladega, this organization also has hardly anything to show. I guess you could argue that three of their five drivers made the Chase. The one thing that strikes me more than anything else is Carl Edwards being winless this season after a career-high nine victories in 2008. This one could possibly be the curse of the Aflac duck...
That's all I have for the final edition of 2009. Not counting the last ten races, it's been a great season with a lot of drama on and off the track. Look for me to unveil my brand-new championship format in the next couple of weeks; this one needs a makeover...
