2006 Ford 400

, where the race was held . The Ford 400 was the 36th of 36 scheduled stock car races of the 2006 NASCAR Nextel Cup Series, and the final round of the ten-race season-ending 2006 Chase for the Nextel Cup. It was held on November 19, 2006, in Homestead, Florida, at Homestead–Miami Speedway, The race was held on Homestead–Miami Speedway's standard track; a four-turn oval track. The track's turns are banked from 18 to 20 degrees, while both the front stretch, the location of the finish line, and the back stretch are banked at three degrees. The final race had a maximum of 195 points available, which meant Kenseth could still win the championship. Johnson had to finish twelfth to become champion because even if Kenseth won, Johnson would still be ahead of him. If Kenseth won and he and Johnson were tied on points, both drivers would have five victories, but Johnson would be the champion because he had more second-place finishes than Kenseth. Greg Biffle was the race's defending champion. Johnson, the 2004 championship runner-up, had been second in points entering the past three races at Homestead, and stated his strategy was to finish ahead of his competitors. "I can't express enough how much experience in this sport has helped me as a driver. My fifth year, fifth time being in a championship situation. We've been under pressure and we've been in this situation and we are a better, stronger, more mature race team from it. I think the last few months, we've been able to show that." Kenseth stated that his only chance of winning his second championship was if Johnson did not finish, and he was pessimistic given his recent poor performance, "He's going to have to have problems, and we're going to have to have a lot of good luck to get in there. We can't do it on performance. We can't run 25th on performance right now." Two drivers made their first attempts to qualify for a race this season. After leaving Formula One in July 2006, Juan Pablo Montoya partook in the Ford 400 for Chip Ganassi Racing in its 30 car as preparation for his full-time Nextel Cup Series debut for the 2007 season after team owner Chip Ganassi filed an additional entry for the event. Brewco Motorsports kept Busch Series driver Casey Atwood for Homestead, hoping to qualify for the team's second Nextel Cup Series race, and Atwood's first since racing for Evernham Motorsports in the 2003 season. == Practice and qualifying ==

Three practice sessions were held before the Sunday race; one on Friday and two on Saturday. The first session lasted 90 minutes, the second 60 minutes and the third 35 minutes. Dale Jarrett crashed into a trackside wall during the practice session. He used a backup car for the qualifying session later that day. Kahne took his sixth pole position of the season, and the 12th of his career with a time of 30.293 seconds, equalling Kurt Busch's total of pole positions won in 2006. He was joined on the grid's front row by Riggs, his Evernham Motorsports teammate, who was 0.007 seconds slower. Johnson, a Chase for the Nextel Cup driver, qualified 13th, while Kenseth, another chase driver, set the 19th-fastest lap. After qualifying, Kahne said, "The engine package we brought here is very strong and the Dodge Chargers are working well. We'll see what happens, but it's pretty nice to have all three cars up front." At the end of the second practice session, Travis Kvapil's engine failed. Qualifying results == Race ==

Live television coverage of the race began at 14:01 Eastern Standard Time (UTC+04:00) in the United States on NBC. Around the start of the race, weather conditions were clear with the air temperature at . Jenna Edwards, Miss Florida USA 2007, began pre-race ceremonies with an invocation. American Idol season five winner and blues rock singer Taylor Hicks performed the national anthem, and Ford board of directors member Edsel Ford II commanded the drivers to start their engines. During the pace laps, Bowyer and Robby Gordon moved to the back of the grid because of engine changes. (pictured in 2007) finished the race in third to place in that position in the final points' standings. The race commenced at 15:11 local time but one lap was deduced from its scheduled distance because NASCAR located debris on the track between the first and second corners. Montoya was uninjured. Yeley led at the lap 257 restart, but was quickly passed by Biffle on the inside. On the following lap, Yeley lost second to Kahne. On the 259th lap, Johnson was passed by Harvick for seventh place, and Hamlin overtook Yeley for third. Truex finished second, Hamlin third, Kahne fourth, and Harvick fifth. Kenseth took sixth, Riggs came seventh, and Edwards placed eighth. Bowyer completed the top ten finishers. Third-placed Hamlin was not upset about not winning the championship, "I figured we just fell back to fifth or sixth in points and who knows where we were going to end up, I was angry at the time, but I settled myself back down. It's been a great year for us," Hamlin said. "I'm ecstatic the way we ran. This is the way I wanted to end the year is with a top-five finish [because] these guys deserve it." Afterward, Johnson began celebrating his first Nextel Cup Series championship. He said of his achievement, "I think we knew in our hearts we could do it all along, we just got into some bad luck at the beginning. That's what let us get the momentum, let us sleep well at night, is because we knew this team was capable of winning a championship. We just had to have some good luck." Kenseth expressed disappointment with his performance during the Chase for the Nextel Cup, but was pleased to be runner-up to Johnson, "If we had run in the Chase like we did in August, we would have been 200 points clear before Homestead, If you look at all the problems people had in the Chase and we didn't have any, that was dragging me down. But this is probably one of the best seasons I've ever had. I won four races, and we could have won eight or nine." After the race, NASCAR officials summoned Newman and his crew chief Matt Borland to meet with them about his accident with Montoya on lap 252 so that they could question the pair about whether the contact was intentional. Montoya said of the crash after leaving the circuit's infield care center, "It's one of those things that happens in racing. The Texaco/Havoline Dodge was a great car today. Everybody worked so hard on this racecar. It's a shame. It's a fast racecar." According to Newman, Montoya's car cut in front of his, "I felt bad for the situation because, obviously, it looked like I was retaliating, but that's not the case. That's what we just talked about." Johnson won the Drivers' Championship with 6,475 points, 56 more than second-placed Matt Kenseth. Hamlin was the highest-placed rookie in third with 6,407 points. Harvick and Earnhardt were fourth and fifth with 6,397 and 6,328 points respectively, and Jeff Gordon, Burton, Kahne, Martin, and Kyle Busch rounded out the top ten drivers in the final Chase for the Nextel Cup standings. Chevrolet won the Manufacturers' Championship with 279 points. Dodge was 76 points behind in second, and Ford was a further point behind in third. The race took three hours, 12 minutes, and 23 seconds to complete, and the margin of victory was 0.389 seconds. Race results == Standings after the race ==

• Note: Only the top ten positions are included for the driver standings. These drivers qualified for the Chase for the Nextel Cup. == References ==