Jimmie Johnson gets more honors

  Jimmie Johnson at the White House. Now he's AP's Athlete of the Year. (Photo: Getty Images for NASCAR)
  

   By Mike Mulhern
   mikemulhern.net

   Looks like someone out there really was paying attention to NASCAR: Jimmie Johnson was just named the male Athlete of the Year by the Associated Press.
   That's the first time in history for a NASCAR driver to get the AP award.
   Winning a fourth straight NASCAR Cup championship obviously caught some eyes.
   The voting is done by a panel of editors at US newspapers. The 34-year-old Johnson got 42 votes; runnerup Roger Federer, the tennis player, got 30.
   Tiger Wood, AP's Athlete of the Decade, got only nine votes in this balloting.
   There was no indication when the voting was actually done, and there was no immediate listing of the people doing the voting.