Jimmie Johnson, driver of the #48 Lowe’s/Kobalt Tools Chevrolet, celebrates in Victory Lane after winning the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Party in the Poconos 400 at Pocono Raceway on June 9, 2013
Photo – Nick Laham/Getty Images

Jimmie Johnson crossed the finish line first Sunday afternoon after he put on a dominate performance resulting with the No.48 car in victory lane. No one was close to contending with the five-time champion today, allowing him to score his third victory of the season. Johnson is off to an absolute sizzling start this season, heading into the summer, and he will be looking to stay hot.

The race started out with Carl Edwards taking the lead from pole-sitter Johnson on lap one, but by lap ten, it was Johnson back to the top spot. After a debris caution, Ryan Newman stayed out to take the lead on the restart, but Johnson was able to quickly regain the lead. Newman and Johnson swapped for the lead again, but Johnson took full control for the rest of the race, with 47 laps remaining.

Cautions breed cautions and that statement was especially true toward the end of the race with four quick cautions. The first of four came out with 28 laps remaining when Juan Pablo Montoya lost control of his car going into turn two and went into Matt Kenseth and both spun around. The second of four yellow-flags flew when Aric Almirola got into Dave Blaney off turn one and Blaney spun on the short-shoot. A.J Allmendinger had problems to bring out the fifth caution of the day and soon after that with seven laps remaining, Dave Blaney got into the wall again to bring out the sixth and last caution.

Restart after restart, no one was able to keep up with Johnson and throughout all of those late-race restarts, he was able to pull ahead and control the race. Dominance times one thousand led Johnson to the winner’s circle after he pulled off a flawless performance. The point leader padded his lead today and he’s starting to show why he’s the guy to beat when the Chase rolls around in September. Johnson is not known as the summer guy, but if he keeps this performance up, we’ll be talking about these being the hottest months of the year with Johnson rolling right on to the Chase for his sixth championship.

Results via ESPN.com