FONTANA, Calif. – Cale Yarborough once said, “If you’ve got luck on your side, don’t worry about all the other stuff.”

Maybe luck is why Jimmie Johnson has won four NASCAR Sprint Cup championships.

Johnson’s latest good luck came this past Sunday in the Sprint Cup Auto Club 500, as he was able to win his fifth race at the California track.

“Fortune certainly played a part in today’s win,” said Johnson. “We were on pit road at the right time. “I was worried about Kevin (Harvick), because I knew he had a good car, and he had gotten by me once today.”

Johnson had pitted for four fresh tires on lap 230 of the 250- lap race when Brad Keseloswki spun, bringing out a caution. Johnson’s pit crew was able to get him off pit road just onetenth of a second ahead of the race leaders, which meant Johnson was able to stay on the lead lap. Two other cars that were on pit road with Johnson weren’t so lucky and had to go to the tail end of the field.

Jeff Burton, Kevin Harvick, and Mark Martin, who were leading the race, pitted after Johnson. When the race went back to green, Johnson was the new leader, followed by Harvick and then Burton.

Harvick actually caught Johnson with three laps remaining, but as he attempted an outside pass, he brushed the wall and lost all momentum. Johnson was unchallenged for the remaining two laps.

Harvick ran a strong race even after an early penalty sent him to the rear of the field for speeding on pit road.

“The 48 saw me coming and moved up and I lost it and got into the wall, and knocked the right front fender in” said Harvick. “We had a good car, and that speeding penalty should have never happened.”

Harvick is the new points leader.

Jeff Burton, Harvick’s teammate, finished a close third.

“We had some good runs going, but we were pretty loose most of the day,” said Burton. “Every time we tightened it up, we couldn’t go.”

Rounding out the top 10 were Mark Martin, Joey Logano, Kurt Busch, Matt Kenseth, Clint Bowyer, Tony Stewart, and Greg Biffle

Jamie McMurray, the polesitter and Daytona 500 winner, finished 17th.

Ryan Newman and Juan Montoya lost engines and both were out about midway of the race.

Top-12 Chase leaders after 2 of 36: 1. Harvick-331, 2. Bowyer- 312, 3. Biffle-304, 4. McMurray- 302, 5. Burton-300, 6. Martin-297, 7. Kenseth-288, 8. Reutimann- 273, 9. Logano-263, 10. Edwards- 262, 11. Kurt Busch-254, 12. Johnson 253

Kyle Busch charges to Nationwide win

Kyle Busch passed Greg Biffle coming down the final stretch to win Saturday’s Nationwide Series Stater Bros. 300 at Fontana, Calif., to give Joe Gibbs Racing its fifth consecutive victory at Auto Club Speedway. Biffle finished second, followed by Brad Keselowski, Carl Edwards and Joey Logano.

The top-10 Nationwide drivers after 2 of 35: 1. Edwards-335, 2. Logano-311, 3. Kyle Busch-304, 4. Allgaier-303, 5. Keselowski-299, 6. Vickers-297, 7. S. Wallace-289, 8. Buescher-271, 9. Biffle-265, 10. Menard-256

Dale Earnhardt Jr. and his team thought they had regained the momentum they needed to become a winner, again. That is something positive he hasn’t had for quite some time.

After coming from 10th on the final lap at Daytona to finish second, Dale Jr. was all pumped up going into Sunday’s Auto Club 500

“You get in a rhythm and with each little move it builds a lot of confidence. It’s the domino effect,” Earnhardt added. “I think it worked out as good as it could have for us at Daytona. Besides wining the race – that would have been incredible – we were fortunate enough to be in that situation.”

However, it was back to his old ways. During a pit stop on lap 133, Earnhardt spun the tires on his car as he was leaving and broke an axle. He finished 32nd, 12 laps down.

Meanwhile Danica Patrick driver of JR Motorsports No. 7 in the Nationwide Series didn’t do well in her second NASCAR race.

She finished 31st, three laps down, and was ahead of only six cars still running at the end of Saturday’s Stater Bros. 300.

But she didn’t like where she finished either. Patrick stormed off pit road when it was over, refusing to talk to TV reporters, and went straight inside her hauler.

After about 15-minutes, she came out and spoke about her day, explaining her anger.

“I’m used to running up front, so it’s shocking when you’re that far back,” Patrick said. “But this is a whole new ball of wax for me and it’s all different. The expectation to stay on the lead lap was probably not realistic. I’m going to have to disconnect from the results because it’s probably not going to be what I’m used to”

“And it’s a little overwhelming when people want to talk to you right as you get out of the car. Everybody needs a couple of minutes to cool down.”

Matt Kenseth has a new crew chief on his No. 17 Roush Fenway Ford team. Todd Parrott, who was the crew chief for Dale Jarrett when he won the 1999 Cup championship, took over for Drew Blickensderfer in time for last Sunday’s race.

“I just felt like it needed something to throw a spark in the thing,” said Kenseth. “We were just missing something on the team. I didn’t feel the way we operated at Daytona that we could win races and win championships.”

Kenseth won the first two races of 2009, but has failed to win since then, and failed to make the Chase.

Instead of making a change during the off season, Kenseth made the move after an eighthplace finish at Daytona last weekend, when he managed a top-10 finish after running in the middle of the pack most of Sunday’s race. Kenseth took the blame for the timing of the switch, explaining that team owner Jack Roush asked him at the end of last season if any changes needed to be.

“It’s really hard to explain the timing of the change,” Kenseth continued. “It doesn’t make any sense. Instead of dragging it out, it was just something that needed to be done. We needed to get a head start on this thing instead of waiting until we’re halfway into the season and it’s too late to dig ourselves out.”

Weekend racing: The Cup and Nationwide teams are at the 1.5- mile Las Vegas Motor Speedway. The Truck teams are idle until March 6.

Sat., Feb. 27, Nationwide Series race 3 of 35; starting time: 2:30 p.m. (EDT); TV: ESPN2.

Sun., Feb. 28, Sprint Cup Shelby American, race 3 of 36; Starting time: 1 p.m. (EDT); TV: Fox.

Racing trivia question: What series did Nationwide driver James Buescher compete in last year?

Last week’s question: Which Cup team is Elliott Sadler driving for this season? Answer. He drives the No. 19 for Richard Petty Motorsports. Sadler’s wife gave birth to the couple’s first child last week.

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