Johnson chases down his first season championship

HOMESTEAD, Fla. -- Hard though he tried, Jimmie Johnson just couldn't give another Nextel Cup championship away.

Johnson completed his dream season by cruising over every speedbump in his path, overcoming debris in his grill, a missing roll of tape, a loose lug nut, treacherous traffic and his own nerves to finally win the NASCAR championship that had taunted him the past two years.

On Sunday, the little things that used to sink him turned out to be nothing more than mere annoyances.

Johnson, the perpetual points leader for the past three regular seasons who always found a way to collapse in the Chase, finally put it all together, wrapping up his title with a 9th-place finish at Homestead-Miami Speedway. He finished with a 56-point lead over Matt Kenseth.

"It's going to take a little bit of time for this to soak in, just to think what this team has accomplished and the year we've had," Johnson said. "Being a champion, it's the only thing I ever wanted to be."

Greg Biffle won the Ford 400 for the third straight season, beating rookies Martin Truex Jr. and Denny Hamlin to the finish line. Kasey Kahne was fourth and Kevin Harvick rounded out the top five. Kenseth was sixth.

Juan Pablo Montoya, making the first Nextel Cup start of his budding NASCAR career, ran as high as 13th, but his race ended in a fiery wreck 15 laps from the finish.

The race was delayed nearly eight minutes to clean the track, briefly postponing Johnson's long-awaited celebration. No matter for Johnson, who finished lower than second for the first time in six races.

But he didn't need to be flawless to win this one: He started the day with a cushy margin that required him to only stay out of trouble and finish 12th or better to wrap up the title.

Unfortunately for Johnson, nothing is ever that easy.

His troubles started a mere 15 laps into the race, when flying debris punched a gaping hole in the grill of the No. 48 Chevrolet. When he went in for repairs, his crew couldn't find any tape to patch it.

Later, he nearly pulled away from a pit stop with a loose lug nut. Then he had to avoid Robby Gordon's spinning car.

.When it was over, Johnson, a two-time championship runner-up, had his elusive title.

"It was such a long day to get here," he said in Victory Lane. "There were times when we were down, and out and in the back and had to come back through. This just means the world to me, it's the most amazing day of my life."

Knaus then received a celebratory hug from owner Rick Hendrick, who won his sixth championship as a car owner, and another from Ray Evernham, the championship crew chief turned rival car owner who taught Knaus much of what he knows.

"This team has really come into its own over the last year," Knaus said. "I just couldn't be prouder. We had to battle back from a lot of weird stuff this year, and they held strong."