Did You Know?: NASCAR Milestones

• That Jimmie Johnson will attempt to become the first driver in NASCAR history to win four consecutive NASCAR Sprint Cup Series championships (Well, OK, maybe you put that one together already.)

• That for the first time in his 11-year NASCAR Sprint Cup Series career, Tony Stewart will be driving for a different team other than Joe Gibbs Racing. Stewart is the new driver/owner of Stewart-Haas Racing and will drive the No.14 Chevrolet in 2009. (Gotta wonder how the temper will fare? Probably OK.)

• That Joey Logano will be the youngest driver ever to run the Daytona 500. He’ll be 18 years, 8 months and 22 days on February 15. The previous youngest was Clark Dwyer in 1983. He was 19 years, 1 month and 8 days old.

• That Jeff Gordon needs to lead 89 laps to reach 20,000 career laps led. (That's a lot of clean air!)

• That Richard Childress Racing teammates Kevin Harvick and Clint Bowyer look to extend an all-time record this season. Harvick has run 80 consecutive races without a DNF. Clint Bowyer is second with 73. (Ohhh, media curse!)

• That as long as Jeff Gordon makes each of his starts this year, he’ll move into the sixth spot for most consecutive starts. He now has 545. By season’s end, he’ll have 581.

• That with two poles, Ryan Newman will move into the top 10 on the all-time poles list. Newman enters this season with 43 career poles. (I hope he and his new team can do it!)

• That Bill Elliott will make his 800th career NASCAR Sprint Cup Series start with his fourth start of 2009.

• That Ron Hornaday Jr. needs one win to become the first NASCAR Camping World Truck Series driver with 40 career wins.

• That there have been back-to-back first-time race winners in each of the last four NASCAR Nationwide Series seasons. Brad Keselowski and Joey Logano did it last year, winning their first races at Nashville and Kentucky.

• That the Atlanta Motor Speedway event on March 8 will be the track’s 100th NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race.

• That three tracks will be celebrating their 80th NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race this season:
Dover, Michigan and Talladega.

source: NASCAR media