NASCAR Trivia: How many Grandfather Clocks does Jimmie Johnson have?

NASCAR driver and team owner, Jimmie Johnson collected nine wins at Martinsville Speedway during his full-time run in the Cup Series between the early 2000s and 2020s.

Martinsville Speedway, which is one of NASCAR’s oldest tracks, offers a special prize to winners. Since 1964, winners at the South-Central Virginia short track have taken home the Ridgeway Grandfather Clock as the winner's trophy. Track founder H. Clay Earles came up with the idea to give drivers something their families would proudly display at home.

Seven-time NASCAR Cup champion Johnson won nine Martinsville grandfather clocks and keeps most of these trophies in his 'man cave'.

"They are all on display in my man cave, all but one. One I gifted to Bruton Smith. Being friends with him and neighbors essentially, he would always talk about that Martinsville clock and one conversation, he said, ‘If you win another one of those things, I need that in the foyer of my home,'” said Johnson (via NASCAR.com).

Richard Petty, Darrell Waltrip, and Jeff Gordon are the only three drivers to have a higher or the same number of Martinsville wins than Johnson at 15, 11, and 9, respectively.

"Took me a while to figure out how to drive that place" - Jimmie Johnson on the Martinsville track

Jimmie Johnson celebrates in victory lane after winning the Tums Fast Relief 500 at Martinsville Speedway - Source: Imagn

Jimmie Johnson is tied with Richard Petty and Dale Earnhardt for the most Cup Series championship title wins in NASCAR. The 49-year-old has two Daytona 500 and six Coca-Cola 600 wins but his second most wins in the series came at Martinsville. Johnson won 11 races at the 1.000 mi (1.609 km) oval track at Dover International Speedway.

Owner-driver of the Legacy Motor Club team, Johnson talked about the 0.526 miles (0.847 km) track in Ridgeway, Virginia, and revealed his early career struggles there. He won his first Cup race at Martinsville Speedway in 2004.

"It took me a while to figure out how to drive that place. Martinsville and Indianapolis were the two tracks I really struggled with early in my career. But I finally got it and once that happened, I was able to lean on the depth that Hendrick Motorsports had for that race track and the power under the hood and all the stuff that’s always made the organization so successful there." Johnson said [via HendrickMotorsports.com].

Johnson won the Martinsville spring race, starting 20th, and led 113 laps in 2007. He also won the fall race at the track that year. Martinsville became one of Johnson’s best tracks but after the last Martinsville win in 2016, his performance at the track dropped with only one top-10 finish in his last eight races.

Jimmie Johnson retired from full-time racing in 2020 and now competes part-time in the Cup Series for Legacy Motor Club.