Given the professional history, the friendship, and the long association Jimmie Johnson and Jeff Gordon share, the night when the 7x NASCAR Cup champion got inducted into the Hall of Fame was bound to be special for Gordon, who was a big part of Johnson landing the #48 seat at Hendrick Motorsports. But the night was “extra special” for Gordon for one reason.
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Ahead of the HoF ceremony, Gordon had a small chat with the media in which he first applauded the inductees, the panel, and the NASCAR Hall of Fame for pulling the whole thing together and elevating the sport. The 4x Cup champion then revealed why the night meant a little bit more to him personally.
“I will say tonight is extra special for me just because I’ve been able to see this journey of Chad and Jimmie and to see how they rose to the level that they did, changed the game, raised the bar for everybody, including myself,” he said, as he cracked a hilarious joke with, “That really wasn’t the plan when they came in. We were supposed to share a little more of that success.”
“But no, I couldn’t be more proud of them and again, so well deserved because I saw how hard they worked and how good they were.”
How Jimmie Johnson caught the attention of Jeff Gordon
Even though Jeff Gordon claims he played “a small part” in bringing Jimmie Johnson to Hendrick Motorsports, he gave a big chunk of credit to the timing of it all. He recalled how one day Rick Hendrick asked Gordon, who had tamed Darlington by that point in his career, to go to the racetrack and help Ricky Hendrick in testing an Xfinity car.
“I just remember getting down there and I was on top of the truck while his car was getting warmed up and we were watching some other cars. One of the first cars on the track was this red-white-blue #92 car,” Gordon remembered. Soon after, Johnson caught Jeff Gordon’s attention who asked Ricky Hendrick, “‘Who is that guy?'”
Gordon then asked Hendrick about Johnson some more, questions like how many times he’d been to Darlington given how he was driving, to which the answer came, “I think he just saw the place today. I was talking to him earlier. He’s never been here before.”
“I was like, ‘Whoa!'”
After that, Jeff Gordon went to the garage and introduced himself to Johnson, post which one thing led to the other which eventually led to everything lining up for Hendrick Motorsports to start a fourth team and put the future NASCAR Hall of Famer Jimmie Johnson behind the wheel.
