NASCAR: Coke 600 ends Johnson's losing streak

Jimmie Johnson claimed his first NASCAR Sprint Cup win of 2014 in the Charlotte 600 after a race-long battle with Kevin Harvick and Matt Kenseth.

Polesitter Johnson, the first man to win the 600 from pole position since he himself did in 2004, established an early lead at a track where he had not won since '10, but now holds the Cup record with seven triumphs.

"It's great to win, but believe me, all the hype and all the concern and worry, that was elsewhere," Johnson said. "That wasn't in my head... We've had great races, and we've had opportunities there in front of us and had stuff taken away. And we've had bad races. I have to be honest about that, too."

Stewart-Haas driver Harvick pursued Johnson for the majority of the opening stints, taking the lead from the Hendrick Chevrolet for the first time on lap 76. The pair dominated the first half of the race, leading all but three laps between them in the fading sunshine.

As darkness fell, Kenseth, who was also searching for his first win of 2014, took the lead after the race's seventh caution period, moving past Johnson at the restart and making it a three-way fight into the closing stages.

Carl Edwards briefly looked like he might cause an upset on a fuel-saving strategy, but the final caution forced him to abandon that plan, and on the last restart Kenseth seized the lead from Jeff Gordon, who had gained places by only changing two tires at his last pit stop.

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Johnson reclaimed the lead for the final time on lap 391 of 400, diving underneath Kenseth after the Joe Gibbs Toyota driver had tried to hold him off with a strong block.

Harvick grabbed second from Kenseth soon afterward, but blamed pit stop delays for costing him a shot at the win.

"We had a fast car all night," Harvick said. "Just kind of fumbled again on pit road. Got behind, got a lap down. We needed a 700-mile race to get back to where we needed to be.

"We left two wheels loose and played catch-up the rest of the night. We've got to clean pit road up."

Edwards narrowly beat Jamie McMurray to fourth, with Gordon ending up seventh behind Brian Vickers. Gordon reported only minor issues with the back pain that had sidelined him during practice on Saturday.

Kurt Busch's Indianapolis 500/Charlotte 600 "double" attempt ended when the engine in his Stewart-Haas Chevrolet expired after he had raced 906 miles in one day. He had earlier finished sixth at the Indianapolis 500 in his Indy car debut.

His teammate Danica Patrick briefly ran second, after starting from her highest qualifying position on a non-restrictor plate race in fourth. She would later get caught up in a six-car crash triggered when Marcos Ambrose lost the rear end of his Richard Petty Motorsports Ford and slammed into the Turn 4 wall, before ultimately retiring when her engine, already a cylinder down, finally exploded.