Truex Jr. behind the wheel of the No. 19 at the ROVAL (Photo: Jared Bokanoski | The Podium Finish)
CONCORD, N.C. – Despite a subpar 20th place finish Sunday afternoon at the Charlotte Motor Speedway ROVAL, Martin Truex Jr. advanced into the Round of 8 in the Cup Series Playoffs.
Coming into the ROVAL, Truex Jr. was 15 points above the cut line to advance in the playoffs, so he did have a small point cushion. The Mayetta, New Jersey native scored a respectable starting position, qualifying 11th. During Stage 1, Truex Jr. did not gain any track position and was running 14th with under 10 laps to go in the stage. However, he ended the Stage with a fourth place finish after crew chief James Small decided to not pit before the end of the stage with the cars in front of Truex Jr in the No. 19.
The Joe Gibbs Racing driver managed a second top 10 stage finish, securing an eighth place Stage 2 finish by again choosing to not pit at the end of the stage. Truex Jr. had a clean Stage 3, but was not able to make up any track position, and fell back to 20th by Lap 100 when AJ Allmendinger took the checkered flag. Aside from his 20th place finish, Truex Jr. also left the ROVAL 15 points above the cut line.
Notably, Truex Jr. spoke after the race about how he was able to advance in the playoffs, and the strategy of his team throughout the race.
“Stage points and bonus points” Truex Jr. said. “I didn’t create the system. We used it to our advantage. That won’t get us through the next one. The next one, you’ve got to be running up front. Two winners of the next three races are probably going to be Playoff guys that are still going. Need to turn it up and we need to figure it out quickly.”
“That’s the beauty and that’s the thing that sucks about this deal, you know what I mean,” Truex Jr. added. “I’m sure there’s guys that are upset. They outran us enough to get in, but they didn’t have the bonus points. It is what it is. I hate that we didn’t run better today or finish better at least. I thought the first two stages maybe our car was pretty decent, but, man, I don’t know what happened. Need to go back and look at that. It wasn’t much fun, but we made it so here we go. We’ll try three more.”
Truex Jr. also mentioned his thoughts in general about the ROVAL and the position his team is in for the next three races of the season ahead of the championship race.
“Yeah, 100%. I’m definitely excited we’re not coming back here again,” Truex Jr. stated. “This track has just been a thorn in our side. Feel good about moving on and feel good about what we can do the next three races. Some good tracks for us and hopefully we can get something going. It’s been a pretty tough playoffs so far.”
