DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — Jimmie Johnson is set to follow his former Hendrick Motorsports teammates Jeff Gordon and Dale Earnhardt Jr. into the broadcast booth.

For now, it's just for one race, the FS1 telecast of the NASCAR Xfinity Series contest on Feb. 23.

“It’s always been on my mind,” Johnson told USA TODAY Sports ahead of Thursday’s announcement by Fox Sports. “I absolutely would entertain (broadcasting) when I retire, but it won’t be any time soon.”

The seven-time NASCAR Cup Series champion will join former champ Kevin Harvick and play-by-play announcer Adam Alexander for that Atlanta race. It will be one of eight broadcasts in which Harvick again will serve as an analyst this season for Fox Sports, including a third consecutive year of a “Drivers Only” Xfinity broadcast.

This year's “Drivers Only” broadcast will be in Charlotte on May 25. It will feature Harvick, reigning Cup champ Joey Logano and Clint Bowyer as analysts along with Ryan Blaney, Erik Jones, Bubba Wallace, Brad Keselowski, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. and Johnson's former crew chief, Chad Knaus, in other roles.

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Harvick credited Fox Sports CEO and executive producer Eric Shanks for Johnson’s NASCAR analyst debut.

“Having Jimmie up there is going to be a lot of fun,” Harvick told USA TODAY Sports. “For me, it’s exciting and I’m excited to sit in the booth and see how it all shakes out. We are both going to have a lot of fun.”

Harvick has been forward about his post-driving broadcast ambitions. Johnson said “there is certainly an opportunity there” if he decides to go in that direction.

Actually, for Johnson, it’d be going back to his off-road racing roots. Johnson not only raced in the Short-course Off-road Drivers Association (SODA) two decades ago, but he also served as a reporter.

“I did pit road reporting for three other divisions and then raced mine,” Johnson said. “They had somebody else there in case I won. I have some experience. It was something that was really helpful to me to stay relevant in the sport and helped me get to where I am today. I have always enjoyed it. It’s always been in my mind.”

Johnson’s stock-car career – with the backing of Gordon, who will begin his third season as a Fox Sports analyst for Sunday’s Daytona 500 – quickly put those broadcasting aspirations aside. He won the Xfinity race at Chicagoland Speedway in 2001 en route to becoming the most dominant Cup driver of his generation.

Johnson has been in the booth with Harvick a couple times as an observer. He hasn’t done any simulated races – and Harvick said Johnson really doesn’t have to.

“When you have the current knowledge of the situation, you can recognize things happening on the track,” Harvick said. “You get to see a lot of those when there are current drivers in the booth.”

Asked who he looked up to as a broadcaster, Johnson mentioned former Speed Channel personality Dave Despain.

“I think so many do a great job,” Johnson said. “Being up there sharing their love of racing and having that come through on a telecast, that’s the best way to pull it off. You don’t have to always be right. You don’t have to be the one saying the difficult things or playing the blame game. I personally love watching people who call the race who really love racing.”

Follow A.J. Perez on Twitter @byajperez