Good times keep rolling for Truex
KANSAS CITY, Kan. — With his dark shades, scruffy facial hair and disarming smile, NASCAR driver Martin Truex Jr. already looked like the coolest cat at the club.
He has even more reason to be relaxed and confident this weekend at Kansas Speedway.
Start with the fact that he has already clinched a spot in the next round of the Cup Series playoffs with his win at Charlotte Motor Speedway two weeks ago. Brad Keselowski, who won last Sunday at Talladega Superspeedway, is also assured of advancing to the penultimate Round of 8, but former season champions Kyle Busch, Jimmie Johnson and Matt Kenseth are on the bubble.
Then consider that Truex always runs well at intermediate length tracks, finishing in the top 10 — including three wins — in his past five starts on such layouts. He’s especially good at Kansas, where he routinely runs up front and shook off some bad luck concerning reaching victory lane at the track with a win in May.
Finally, there’s the fact that Truex’s car was fast the moment it was unloaded Friday, with the series’ points standings leader winning the pole position and earning not only a prime pit stall for today but also next week at Martinsville Speedway.
That all led to this admission from Johnson, who is chasing his record-setting eighth Cup Series title: “The 78 has sort of controlled the year. We’re all jealous of the situation they’re in.”
It’s not as if Truex and his Furniture Row Racing team have lucked into this situation.
The only NASCAR team headquartered west of the Mississippi River went through years of fits and starts, with team owner Barney Visser often pouring gobs of his own money into the project. And things didn’t look as if
they were getting much better when Truex came aboard for the 2014 season.
He managed only five top-10 finishes, led a single lap all year and finished 24th in the standings.
But the team kept grinding, and the next year Truex dominated the spring race at Kansas before a poor pit stop shuffled him back. The result nevertheless sent confidence soaring, and the team broke its 69-race winless drought at Pocono Raceway that summer — and quite simply never looked back.
With a new manufacturer in Toyota and a new alliance with Joe Gibbs Racing, the team won four times last season and cruised into the playoffs. That number of victories has soared to six this season, and Truex needs to lead just 23 laps at Kansas today to break the 2,000 mark for the year.
“It’s just racing. You never know,” Truex said. “We’ll go race hard, and I know we’ll have what it takes to win, and hopefully we can get it done this time around.”
All his success has quite literally paid off, too. The team announced last week it filled out its sponsorship for next season, which is never a guarantee even for top drivers these days. Bass Pro Shops and 5-hour Energy are sharing primary sponsorship, with Auto Owners Insurance helping out.
“For me, it’s terrific,” Visser said during the announcement. “You don’t see me dancing in the aisles, but inside I am. Martin has just delivered. It’s just been remarkable what he and the guys have been able to accomplish. So we have to attribute it to that.”
Bell’s breakthrough
Christopher Bell raced to his first Xfinity Series victory by beating dominant Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Erik Jones after they made contract with four laps left Saturday afternoon at Kansas.
Bell led for just four laps, hanging in second place behind Jones for much of the race before sliding in front of him shortly before the collision. Jones was coming from the top of the track when he hit the back of Bell’s car.
Jones, who led 186 laps of 200 laps and won both of the first two stages, failed to finish the race.
Pole winner Tyler Reddick finished second, while Ryan Blaney was third.
Hamilton on pole
AUSTIN, Texas — Lewis Hamilton stormed through qualifying Saturday to earn the pole for today’s U.S. Grand Prix, with Formula One title rival Sebastian Vettel getting a big push on his final lap to grab second.
That sets up a duel as Hamilton chases a possible fourth career season championship. The Mercedes driver holds a 59-point lead over Vettel with four races to go, and Vettel will be desperate to push for the win.
Hamilton has dominated at the Circuit of the Americas, setting track records Friday and Saturday. He will be chasing his fourth consecutive win here and fifth overall at the track since 2012.