NEW YORK - Joey Logano sat among the large crowd gathered for NASCAR's awards luncheon Thursday afternoon and watched in awe as sponsor after sponsor stuffed envelopes containing $100,000 checks into the pockets of repeat Nextel Cup champion Jimmie Johnson.
It was but one of the many highlights the 17-year-old Logano, of Middletown, Conn., enjoyed during Champions Week festivities.
Logano earned the right to hobnob with Johnson, Craftsman Truck Series champion Ron Hornaday, and Busch Series champion Carl Edwards by winning the Busch East Series in record fashion. Logano, a development driver who is under contract to Joe Gibbs Racing until he turns 21, this season won six races to become the youngest and winningest rookie champion in Busch East history.
So, what snapshots of his season would leave a lasting impression?
"Well, coming up here, for one, was real cool," Logano said. "There's so much that happened this year, I can look back four or five years down the road and say, 'Wow!' I think that's a good thing in my career. It'll be cool to look back at something like that."
Logano, who had yet to celebrate his 17th birthday, had tongues wagging when he won his first race, a NASCAR West Series event in Phoenix in April. He later won the Busch East opener at Greenville-Pickens (S.C.) Speedway. Logano's season, though, was highlighted by his victory in a Busch East-West event in May at Iowa Speedway, where he outdueled Nextel Cup driver Kevin Harvick, who the night before had won the $1 million Nextel Cup All-Star race at Lowe's Motor Speedway in Concord, N.C.
"I think he did a great job," Harvick said of Logano. "The track was very conducive to side-by-side racing and we were fortunate to have that, but he did a great job and didn't run over anybody."
Logano, who tallied 2,123 points to win the Busch East title ahead of Sean Caisse (1,957) and Peyton Sellers (1,862), wrapped up his season in October with a victory in the
"We go to win and we don't go to run second," Logano said. "But to win six races this year was remarkable, but thanks go to the whole team because they worked hard all year in the shop and I was able to do the best I can and we were able to come up with a championship."
And so, as he sat there among those who feted Johnson, Logano could not help but wonder what it would be like to be in Johnson's shoes.
"It's always been my dream to be up there and to win a [Cup] championship," Logano said. "You know, I'm taking it one day at a time right now, but it's always been a dream and that's what we're looking for."
Man of the people
The phenomenon that is Dale Earnhardt Jr. never ceases to amaze. Although he was winless in his final season driving the No. 8 Chevrolet for Dale Earnhardt Inc., Junior was named most popular driver for the fifth consecutive time, joining Richard Petty and Bill Elliott as the only others in NASCAR history to win the award that many times in a row.
"I'm extremely honored to win this award again because it puts me with a very select group of drivers who I have a lot of respect for," said Earnhardt, who will drive the No. 88 Chevrolet next season for Hendrick Motorsports. "When I became a Cup driver in 1999, I never would have imagined that we'd be talking about five consecutive most popular driver awards.
"I don't want it to sound like a cliché, but this award really does mean a lot to me after all we have been through this year. I don't underestimate the fans' support. It's been overwhelming."
Quite a first impression
Juan Pablo Montoya, who was named NASCAR's rookie of the year, said he "had no idea it was going to happen" when he made the decision last year to jump from Formula One to stock car racing. "I think we did a decent job all year long," said Montoya, who became the first Hispanic driver to win a NASCAR-sanctioned race when he captured a Busch Series event at Mexico City, then recorded his first Nextel Cup victory, at Infineon Raceway. "I think the wins and everything really helped out. The cars are very different to drive, but I'm a guy who's a quick learner and that really helped me out." Montoya seemed to pave the way for open-wheel racers Patrick Carpentier, Jacques Villeneuve, Dario Franchitti, and Sam Hornish Jr. "I think a lot of people are interested in NASCAR right now because it's the pinnacle of motorsports in America," Montoya said. "If you want to be in the big thing here in American motorsports, it's NASCAR, whether you like it or not." . . . One of the more poignant moments of the awards luncheon came when Betty Jane France, widow of Bill France Jr., the former head of NASCAR, was summoned to the dais to accept the Myers Brothers Award for contributions to the sport in honor of her late husband. "Bill was a character - with character," Betty Jane France said. "He was a great leader, but more so he was a great man. He was tough on the outside, but a teddy bear on the inside. He was a man of calculation, common sense, and compassion. He loved his family and he loved this sport. And this sport has grown into everything that he and his father had envisioned and then some."
Michael Vega can be reached at vega@globe.com; material from personal interviews, sanctioning bodies, sponsors, race teams, and track publicity departments was used in this report.
