Truex sets course to repeat as champion

Martin Truex believes he has the car and the skill to repeat as NASCAR champion this season. His quest gets underway on Sunday at the Daytona 500.

DAYTONA BEACH, FLA. » Martin Truex Sr. had a familiar deckhand this week when he unhitched his boat for a fishing trip off South Florida. Truex first brought his son into the family business aboard a clamming boat as a teenager. The son would rise before dawn, sometimes sprung to life from the chilly bite at sea or the ruckus of choppy waves.

Martin Truex Jr. knew early he wouldn’t anchor to a life at sea.

“I just remember trying to stay awake in between tows. This is so boring,” he

said, laughing. “Then you got to go outside and freeze your you-know-what off for 30 minutes at a time. I remember it being tough and thinking that I don’t want to do this for the rest of my life.”

On this recent trip, the Truex boys skipped the clams and cast a wider net. They caught three sailfish on their first day out and chatted about business, life, and, most of all, the father and son just focused on having a good time.

“We never even talked about racing,” Truex Sr. said.

Oh yeah, his boy’s weekend job. The kid who never developed a taste for clamming instead followed one of his dad’s other passions: Racing.

Once a journeyman driver, Truex enters the 2018 NASCAR season as the class — and envy — of the field. He was a guest on the “Today” show, rooted on his beloved Philadelphia Eagles at the Super Bowl and had the honor of inducting a racing Hall of Famer last month.

He did it all as NASCAR champ.

“It’s been a crazy, busy offseason,” Truex said.

The 37-year-old Truex reaped the rewards of a start-to-finish dominant season that saw him reel off eight victories, 26 top10 finishes and a victory at Homestead that clinched the crown with dad watching from atop the pit box. Did someone say encore? “I feel like the last three seasons, we improved in every category every year,” Truex said.

“Obviously after last year, it’s going to be tough to continue the trend. I think we’re gearing up to do that. I felt like last year we could have won more races.”

Yes, Truex enters Sunday’s Daytona 500 feeling like his best is still ahead in the No. 78 Toyota.

Truex has undergone a career rebirth that is rare in NASCAR history.

Truex won two races over 333 career starts from his debut with Dale Earnhardt Inc. in 2004 through a tumultuous tenure at Michael Waltrip Racing and a head-scratching first season at Furniture Row Racing where he led one lap — one! — all year. He never finished better than 11th in the standings until 2015, and yet has now finished in NASCAR’s version of the Final Four in two of the last three seasons.

“Every place that he’s been prior to where he is now, there was some kind of disaster going on,” Truex Sr. said. “He was never in a spot that was really stable until now. He needed the opportunity and the right people around you. It’s all about the people, like any business.”

Truex found professional peace far removed from NASCAR’s hub in Charlotte, North Carolina. Furniture Row Racing opened in 2005 in Denver on a shoestring budget and a part-time schedule What started as a bit of a blind date has morphed into longterm bliss.