a massive wreck, ending Edwards' championship hopes. Johnson avoided the accident and was put into the position to win the title. On the final restart, he passed Kyle Larson, winning the race and his seventh championship, tying Richard Petty and Dale Earnhardt for the most all-time of championships. 2017: Final NASCAR wins Johnson came into 2017 as the defending NASCAR Cup Series champion. The start of the season didn't go as smoothly as the end of last season, however. Through the first six races of the season, Johnson only scored one Top 10 finish. He then rebounded with back-to-back wins at the 2017 O'Reilly Auto Parts 500 in Texas (started from the rear of the field) and the 2017 Food City 500 at Bristol, his first win at The Last Great Coliseum since 2010. This would be the 14th and final time he won back-to-back races in his career. The following week, Johnson would finish just outside the Top 10 at Richmond, after colliding with teammate Dale Earnhardt Jr late in the event, leading to an eventual flat tire and spin for the driver of the No. 88. Johnson scored his third win of the season at Dover in June after passing Kyle Larson on an overtime restart, which ended under caution with a multicar incident behind the two leaders. This was Johnson's record-holding 11th win at Dover and 83rd career victory, tying him with NASCAR Hall of Famer, Cale Yarborough. This would eventually be Johnson's final NASCAR Cup Series win. The rest of the season didn't go smoothly for Johnson. In the week following his Dover triumph, during the Axalta presents the Pocono 400, Johnson's brakes failed into turn 1 at a speed of over 200 MPH, resulting in a tremendous impact with the outside SAFER barrier. Similarly, directly behind Johnson, fellow competitor Jamie McMurray also experienced a brake failure, and impacted the wall hard, igniting a large vehicle fire. Both Johnson and McMurray were uninjured in the accident. Johnson suffered a big slump during the summer part of the season, failing to earn a Top 5 finish, and only netting three Top 10 finishes. During that stretch, in the 2017 Brickyard 400 on a late race restart, Johnson's Lowe's-sponsored Chevrolet started billowing smoke while running in third-place. Heading into turn 3, the two race leaders Brad Keselowski and Kasey Kahne battled one another, allowing Johnson to close in