Jimmie Johnson, NASCAR’s Unlikely Prodigal Son, Returns at Daytona

But now, after broadening his racing horizons, he is set to return to NASCAR at Sunday’s Daytona 500, this time as a part-time racer and a partial owner of Legacy Motor Club, the team formerly known as Petty GMS Motorsports. He joins an ownership group that includes Petty — the 85-year-old NASCAR legend — and the airline entrepreneur Maury Gallagher.

Motorsports are experiencing an upswing in popularity in the United States, Johnson said, highlighted by the country’s increased interest in Formula 1. He believes NASCAR is poised for similar success and felt that this year was the right time to return.

“The water is rising in the harbor, and it’s lifting all ships,” Johnson said. “In NASCAR, we’re seeing younger owners enter the sport now with different ways of doing business, different ideas and culture. Everyone is really rethinking things, growing and developing.”

For years, NASCAR has hoped to recapture the popularity it once enjoyed in the late 1990s and early 2000s, when drivers like Earnhardt and Jeff Gordon were household names. Johnson came on the scene around then, too, and broke through to dominate the sport, winning five straight Cup Series titles from 2006-10. But interest in NASCAR waned in the years that followed, with many pundits blaming the decline on changes to the racing format, the retirements of star drivers and the introduction of an unpopular, boxy standardized chassis in 2007.

The dip in popularity was particularly evident in TV ratings. According to Nielsen, the 2006 Daytona 500 — which Johnson won — earned 19.4 million viewers, the highest in the event’s history. Last year’s edition garnered less than half of that with 8.9 million viewers, though that represented an improvement over the prior two years.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/18/sports/autoracing/daytona-500-jimmie-johnson.html