Logano shoves past Truex to earn shot at NASCAR championship
MARTINSVILLE, Va. — When the reigning series champion slipped past him with one lap to go at Martinsville Speedway, Joey Logano figured he had lost his shot at racing for NASCAR’s title.
A win would earn Logano one of the four spots in the winner-take-all championship at Homestead-Miami Speedway. So if he didn’t try something, his chance at a Cup championship might slip away.
Logano used an old fashioned bump-andrun on Martin Truex Jr. to Sunday and snatch one of the four tickets to the finale. Truex slid sideways across the finish line and promptly declared Logano won’t take his title from him this year.
“He may have won the battle, but he ain’t winning the damn war. I’m not going to let him win it (the championship.) I’m going to win it,” Truex fumed.
Logano took Truex’s warning in stride. “OK. That’s expected,” Logano said. “This was our shot, maybe our only shot, so we had to make it happen.”
Logano was showered in boos and Truex, standing on pit road next to his third-place car, jeered the winner with both thumbs down as Logano was interviewed over the address system. On pit road, Truex crew chief Cole Pearn Jr. had an angry exchange with Logano crew chief Todd Gordon. Nearly 30 minutes later, Pearn still appeared visibly angry.
Truex and Pearn are part of Furniture Row Racing, which is shutting down at the end of the season, a year removed from its championship run. Naysayers cast doubt on the No. 78 defending its title with the closure looming, but both driver and crew chief are determined to prove everyone wrong.
“With everything we’ve got riding on it, the team closing down, it’s tough to take,” Pearn said of his confrontation with Gordon. “I used a few choice words I probably shouldn’t have. I probably shouldn’t be around a baseball bat