He just keeps winning
Truex gets sixth victory of 2017, advances in playoffs
CONCORD, N.C. — Martin Truex Jr. gave Toyota yet another victory in the NASCAR Cup Series playoffs — the manufacturer is 4-for-4 so far this year — on a humid Sunday afternoon at Charlotte Motor Speedway.
Truex, the most dominant driver in the series all year, has two wins in the playoffs. He also won the first race of the opening round last month at Chicagoland Speedway.
Now his place in the round of eight is secure as the two-time Xfinity Series season champion continues his bid for a first title on the top circuit, but he’s sharing credit for his success.
“Just a total team effort,” Truex said. “Every single guy, every guy on this team just did a perfect job today, and I can’t be more proud of them, and at this time of the year is just when you want it to happen. You dream about days like today. I don’t know if we had the best car, but we damn sure got it in victory lane.”
Kyle Busch, who won the previous two races, wrecked early yet completed Sunday’s race in a damaged car to finish 29th. After complaining of being overheated for most of the 500 miles, he needed immediate medical attention when he climbed from his car.
Busch laid in the grass, packs of ice were placed on his chest and a stretcher was brought to him. Once he felt strong enough, he stood and walked to an ambulance. He received oxygen to treat a high carbon monoxide level.
“I felt like I was having a heat stroke,” Busch said.
The humidity drained several drivers, including Truex, who had to catch his breath after earning his sixth victory of the season.
“Seeing him after the race, how whipped he was, was kind of a shock,” said Cole Pearn, Truex’s crew chief.
Truex worked with his Furniture Row Racing team to steadily improve his car through the first two stages of Sunday’s race. He wasn’t the strongest early — the
first two stage victories went to Kevin Harvick, and Truex didn’t earn stage one playoff points for the first time since July — but he was untouchable by the final segment.
He was at this point a year ago, too, but he had difficulties in the second round of the playoffs and was eliminated. Not this time.
He choked back tears in victory lane in part because of the absence of his longtime girlfriend, Sherry Pollex, who is battling ovarian cancer and has a chemotherapy session scheduled for today. But he was also overwhelmed at what an incredible season he’s had. Truex leads the series in wins, stage wins and playoff points — and he figures with better luck, he would have at least 10 wins already this season.
“It was everything. I couldn’t hold it in anymore,” Truex said. “I thought about Sherry. I thought about winning the first race of this round. I thought about a lot of things, and I just lost it for a minute. It shows just how much this stuff means to us. We put everything into this, everything we have.”
Truex won in overtime after two late cautions created extra laps and forced him to hold off fellow Toyota driver Denny Hamlin on a pair of restarts.
Chase Elliott finished second for the second consecutive week and the sixth time in his career. The 21-year-old
Hendrick Motorsports driver nearly won for the first time in the Cup Series a week ago, but Busch ran him down and passed him for the victory with one lap to go.
Harvick was third and Hamlin finished fourth. Hamlin was drained after the race, too, with his firesuit soaked with sweat stains.
“You usually can tell hydration level from my suit,” Hamlin said. “Anytime it has white streaks all over it, I’m spent pretty good. I feel pretty bad, no doubt about it.”
Among other drivers still in the playoffs, Jamie McMurray was fifth, Jimmie Johnson seventh, Ryan Blaney eighth, Kyle Larson 10th, Matt Kenseth 11th, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. 13th and Brad Keselowski 15th. The bottom four in the standings headed into next weekend’s race at Talladega Superspeedway are Kenseth, Keselowski, Blaney and Stenhouse.
It could have been much worse for Stenhouse. He was all over the leaderboard Sunday until he solidly cracked the top 15 late in the race, but then he was busted for speeding on a late pit stop and had to restart 20th, forcing him to scramble for a better finish in the closing laps.
“We thought if we could be 15th to 10th it would be a good day for us,” he said. “It would be nice to run top 10 all race here, but we struggled up and down.”
Larson’s 10th-place finish gave no indication of how well he competed. An awful pit stop — his tire carrier tripped and fell — dropped him to 12th. Larson then worked his way into the top four, but he was hit by Kurt Busch late in the race, and the damage took him out of contention for racing for the victory.
Earlier, Larson missed his pit box, a mistake that knocked him to 31st, but he clawed his way through traffic and had worked his way into the top five by the end of the first stage.
“I felt like we’ve been better than (Truex) the past two weeks,” Larson said. “Last week was probably the first time in a long time he hasn’t been the most dominant. And then he definitely wasn’t dominant today.
“I felt like I had a car to win. I made a mistake on pit road early. We rebounded from that. And then we had a costly mistake late and somewhat rebounded, but then those last two restarts didn’t go my way.”
Formula One: Hamilton in control of title hunt
SUZUKA, Japan — Lewis Hamilton won the Japanese Grand Prix to take a major step toward earning his fourth Formula One title.
The Mercedes driver, who leads the season points standings, crossed the finish line 1.2 seconds ahead of Max Verstappen to earn his eighth victory of 2017.
Hamilton moved 59 points clear of title rival Sebastian Vettel with four races left. Vettel was forced to retire on the third lap after his Ferrari lost power. Hamilton began the race from the pole position, with Vettel second on the starting grid.
Daniel Ricciardo, Verstappen’s Red Bull teammate, was third, with Mercedes’ Valtteri Bottas fourth and Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen fifth.
The next race is the U.S. Grand Prix on Oct. 22 at the Circuit of the Americas near Austin, Texas.