NASCAR: Jimmie Johnson wants Bluegrass breakthrough - MotorSportsTalk

Doesn’t this sound familiar – Jimmie Johnson, coming to a track where he’s ran well but has never won on in his Sprint Cup career?

No, your mind’s not playing tricks on you. We were talking about this very scenario just two weeks ago heading into Michigan, before Johnson finally nailed down a victory at the fast, two-mile oval.

That left Johnson with four tracks where he’s never picked up a Cup win, and we have another of those tracks coming up this weekend: Kentucky Speedway, where he experienced perhaps one of his more frustrating 2013 outings.

In last year’s race at Kentucky, Johnson led 182 of 267 laps but everything fell apart for him on a late restart with 21 laps to go. Slow to come up to speed at the green flag, Johnson stacked the field and then spun out in Turn 2.

He took the subsequent restart in 25th place and charged all the way to ninth in the final 17 laps. That did little to comfort Johnson, who accused race leader and eventual winner Matt Kenseth of breaking protocol on the restart with 21 laps left.

If you check the statistics, Johnson’s been reliably consistent since the Sprint Cup Series started visiting Kentucky: One Top-5 and three Top-10s in three starts, a strong average finish of 6.0, and the lead in multiple “loop data” categories.

But with three wins already in the bank this season, Johnson will surely being going for broke in order to take a checkered flag in the Commonwealth.

“It would be great to go to Kentucky and win, to cross another track off our list,” he said in a Chevy release today. “We have run really well there, led a lot of laps but just haven’t been able to score a win. Last weekend, we had a really great run going [finished seventh at Sonoma].

“I’m really proud of this team and I’m just looking forward to the upcoming tracks before the off-weekend – Kentucky, Daytona and New Hampshire.”

Johnson certainly has had success at those latter two tracks with three wins apiece at “The World Center of Racing” and the “Magic Mile.” But right now, his focus is on getting rid of his Kentucky goose-egg.

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In a continuing effort to help fans keep track of the on track action, SuperMotocross is in the process of developing and implementing leader lights for the unified series.

Currently Supercross (SMX) utilizes stanchions in the infield that are triggered manually by a race official. At least two stanchions are used in each race as a way to draw the eye to the leader, which is especially useful in the tight confines of the stadium series when lapping often begins before the halfway mark in the 22-bike field. This system has been in place for the past two decades.

Later this year, a fully automated system will move to the bike itself to replace the old system. At that point, fans will be able to identify the leader regardless of where he is on track.

The leader lights were tested in the second Anaheim round this year. An example can be seen at the 1:45 mark in the video above on the No. 69 bike.

“What we don’t want to do is move too fast, where it’s confusing to people,” said Mike Muye, senior director of operations for Supercross and SMX in a press release. “We’ve really just focused on the leader at this point with the thought that maybe down the road we’ll introduce others.”

Scheduled to debut with the first SuperMotocross World Championship race at zMax Dragway, located just outside the Charlotte Motor Speedway, a 3D carbon fiber-printed LED light will be affixed to each motorcycle. Ten timing loops positioned around the track will trigger the lights of the leader, which will turn green.

SMX’s partner LiveTime Scoring helped develop and implement the system that has been tested in some form or fashion since 2019.

When the leader lights are successfully deployed, SuperMotocross will explore expanding the system to identify the second- and third-place riders. Depending on need and fan acceptance, more positions could be added.

SuperMotocross is exploring future enhancements, including allowing for live fan interaction with the lights and ways to use the lighting system during the race’s opening ceremony.

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