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With his past success at New Hampshire International Speedway and his brilliance this season, Jimmie Johnson has a golden opportunity to win Sunday's Nextel Cup race at the New England track, says Benny Parsons of NBCSports.com.

Jimmie Johnson has high hopes for a sizzling summer. His season could get even hotter on Sunday as he's my favorite to win the Nextel Cup race at New Hampshire International Speedway, where the third-year driver swept both Cup races last year.

Working in
Johnson's favor
Johnson has made the most out of many of his starts this season.

There's little wonder he's not only the championship points leader, but that his 105-point advantage over second place Dale Earnhardt Jr. is the largest lead of the season in the Nextel Cup standings.

Johnson has three wins and a series-leading 13 top-five finishes, including 10 in the past 11 races.

He's run so well that he's finished in the top 16 in every race except those at Rockingham and Dover.

Fuel mileage made the difference for Johnson in this race a year ago.

With 37 laps remaining in the race, Johnson took the lead from Ryan Newman and he ran 93 laps on his final tank of fuel, edging out Kevin Harvick for the win.

Last fall, Johnson's strategy to get gas with just 25 laps left in the race proved a winning one as there were no cautions the rest of the way, forcing those vying with Johnson for the victory to eventually pit for fuel.

Johnson's second New Hampshire win came despite three of his crewmen getting injured during the race's first pit stop, when they were accidentally struck by Jeff Gordon.

The three had to visit the infield care center, but came back to work the rest of the race without missing a beat.

Winning on a flat, short track like New Hampshire represented a significant stride forward for Johnson last season.

He knew he could be fast on the one-mile oval, but he also showed the patience needed to win at this challenging venue.

I think he has a strong chance at a repeat performance.

Drivers to watch
Ryan Newman likes racing at this New England flat track, compiling four top 10s (one of them a win) in his last four New Hampshire races.

In those four events, Newman led for a combined 220 laps.

Newman was the top Cup winner last season with eight victories and 11 poles, but it's been a different story this season as he has only one win.

Newman needs for a few things to fall in place, maybe none more important than getting his car to react better to this year's tires.

In last year's two New Hampshire races combined, Jeff Gordon led the most laps (134) of any driver.

Gordon has three wins and 10 top-10 finishes in 18 Cup starts at New Hampshire.

That success has made him the top all-time money winner at the track.

Dale Earnhardt Jr. finished in the top 10 in both New Hampshire races last year.

He will almost certainly start Sunday's race despite a serious accident during practice for an American Le Mans Series race last weekend in California that left him with burns on his chin and both legs.

If Junior's in too much pain to race, he can give way to Martin Truex Jr., who races in the Busch Series for Dale Earnhardt Inc.

And Truex might be a threat to win the race as he knows the New Hampshire track well having raced the venue when he took part in the NASCAR Grand National Division, Busch North Series.

Also a few weeks back, Truex tested cars at New Hampshire for Junior and Michael Waltrip.

With a win at Chicagoland on July 11, Tony Stewart may very well have eased some of the frustration he's felt this season.

I see him in the hunt for a win at New Hampshire.

Rookie Kasey Kahne has been running so well this season that not mentioning his name when writing about the top contenders in any race would be a mistake.

Matt Kenseth will be a threat as he comes off a third and a seventh at New Hampshire last season.

A couple of veteran drivers who are running well are Dale Jarrett and Mark Martin.

Jarrett has seven top-10 results in his last eight New Hampshire races.

Robby Gordon and Jeff Burton are my two darkhorses.

These are two drivers who have not had a lot of success this season, but both run well at New Hampshire.

Robby Gordon has finished in the top 10 in three of his last five races at this oval.

Since winning at New Hampshire in the fall of 2001, Burton, who was ninth in this race in 2003, has placed outside the top 20 at this track only once in seven starts.

Keys to success at New Hampshire
This is a flat track and its long straightaways and tight turns make it similar, but bigger than Martinsville (Va.) Speedway.

In the past, the cars would get such a grip at this track, the pavement actually tore up.

So they have resurfaced it more than once and they finally seemed to have found asphalt that has kept in place very well.

They also changed the track a little bit with the aim of making the groove a little wider and that seemed to have helped the racing.

There is a passing lane to the inside.

With drivers going hard on the brakes, there's also the possibility of a melted right front tire putting someone in the pits. 

The race in New Hampshire will be the first run under NASCAR’s latest rule change, which has the Nextel Cup and the Busch Series adopting a green-white-checkered format to try and make sure races end under green.

The new rule will end the practice of halting a race late with a red flag by settling things with a two-lap green-flag shootout, even if that means running past the scheduled distance.

This rule has been used for years in NASCAR’s Craftsman Truck Series.