A rough start for Jimmie Johnson

Jimmie Johnson’s bid for a fifth straight Cup title didn’t get off to a great start Sunday as he was knocked out of the Daytona 500 before the race ended.

A rear axle broke on Johnson’s car late, and he was forced into the garage with 15 laps to go. Johnson had problems all day. Earlier in the race, he had a punctured tire, perhaps caused by the pothole on the track.

“It’s a long season and we came out of here last year with a crashed race car and still came back,” Johnson said. “We have a little work ahead of us, but we’re good.”

Johnson finished 31st in last year’s Daytona 500, but that didn’t stop him from winning the Cup.

Hendrick teammates Jeff Gordon and Mark Martin had disappointing performances as well. Gordon had been running in the top five at various points in the day but got caught up in a last-lap wreck with Robby Gordon and finished 26th.

Martin dropped out of contention early and finished 12th. He hasn’t won at Daytona in 26 tries.

“Our car was really good, but it doesn’t matter because the green-white-checkered just didn’t work our way,” Jeff Gordon said.

Waltrip’s last 500?

Michael Waltrip had been saying this could be his last Daytona 500. He didn’t sound like it while waiting for the hole in the track to be repaired a second time.

“If they repave it, I’d like to run one more and see what it’s like,” Waltrip said.

He added that he’d like to end his career with 25 Daytona 500s. This was his 24th. Daytona International Speedway President Robin Braig said he didn’t know if the track would be repaved.

Petty’s wife better

Seven-time Daytona 500 champion Richard Petty said his wife, Lynda, has gone through several rounds to treat central nervous system lymphoma, a rare, aggressive cancer in her brain.

Petty said she has been treated at Duke University and is in good spirits.

“We feel like we’ve got the best people in the world looking after her,” Petty said. “We’ve had a couple of treatments, she went through them real good. I went in yesterday morning; she was jumping around and she said get up and get out of here to Daytona.”

Nuts and bolts

Kevin Harvick was in contention all day, but the new green-white-checkered rule did him in. After leading on the second restart, Carl Edwards nudged him out of the way, leading to Jamie McMurray’s victory. “[Edwards] doesn’t really know where he’s going. He went to the middle and kind of jammed it all up,” said Harvick, who finished seventh.

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