Johnson, Earnhardt Jr. Bewildered At What Happened

BY ESPN

Hendrick Motorsports teammates Jimmie Johnson and Dale Earnhardt Jr. entered the Toyota Owners 400 on Sunday at Richmond International Raceway on a wave of good feelings. That came unraveled during the race, and it came with a dustup between them, which ended with bewilderment more than hard feelings.

Earnhardt was feeling lifted in spirit by his announcement Tuesday that he would retire at the end of the season -- something he seems to be completely at peace with -- followed by a visit Thursday to a hospital, where he always draws strength and inspiration from the patients he visits.

Johnson, who is active in his own charitable work most weeks, was coming off consecutive victories at Texas and Bristol.

During driver introductions, Junior got the usual ovation as the conquering hero. Johnson got easily the second-loudest ovation -- he is a seven-time series champion -- and the usual strong smattering of boos to go with it. He might get more boos next week at Talladega.

Just past the middle of the race, Johnson on fresh tires went up the track and simply slammed Earnhardt against the wall. ESPN's Ricky Craven called it "clearly a mistake," on SportsCenter.

Oh my!

Did the spotter not warn Johnson that his teammate was riding up near the wall? Did Johnson just lose focus? Was he on his radio with crew chief Chad Knaus or his crew and thus blocking out communication from his spotter, who was telling him Earnhardt was above him?

We don't know yet.

"I just have to try to figure out if I just didn't hear it being told to me or if it wasn't told to me," Johnson said. "I just feel terrible, obviously.

"Man, I'm surprised our cars even kept rolling after that, because I just body slammed him into the wall, and I could have easily not heard the clear or something else happened. I don't know, but that's the last thing you want to have happen with a teammate.

As for teammate Earnhardt, who went on to finish 30th while Johnson finished 11th?

"He said he didn't see us," Earnhardt said. "He had pitted and got tires, and we were out there running around the top and weren't ready to pit yet. ... He was coming to pass me. I was running the top right against the fence and really wasn't watching the mirror, so I didn't know he was there or anybody was coming.

"TJ [Majors, Earnhardt's spotter] was giving me pretty good warning about guys getting on my inside, but otherwise, when you are running the top, you don't have to worry about it, everybody kind of takes care of you. ... It was an explosion, but the car held up pretty well. It knocked the sway bar arm off of it, so we ran the last bit of the race without a sway bar hooked up."

As bad as it was, the drivers seemed to take it in stride when it was over.