Sunday, 218 races after his last
win at Dover International Speedway, Truex led three times for a total of 51
laps and drove away from challenger Matt Kenseth on the final restart en route
to a dominant victory in the Toyota/Savemart 250 at Sonoma Raceway.
"I
can't even put it into words," said Truex of ending his long victory
drought. "Chad
Johnston has come so far as a crew chief, he's just amazing. We've had cars
that were really fast all year long, we've just had some tough luck. We've been
close so many times – 200 and something races without a win – (that) it feels
amazing to finally get one.”
It’s
not like Truex has been out to lunch these last six years. He has finished
second a half-dozen times in that span, coming agonizingly close to Victory
Lane. Time and again, he and his NAPA Toyota team came up short, adding another
maddening digit to that winless skein.
Sunday,
however, there were no mistakes, no miscalculations, no mechanical failures and
no late-race twists of fate. Nothing but a red-hot race car and a driver determined
not to be denied again. In the decisive final laps, Truex drove away from one
of the finest road racers on the planet in Juan Pablo Montoya, opening a
comfortable, multi-second lead that was not about to be challenged.
When Montoya sputtered out of fuel on the
final lap, Truex’s victory was guaranteed. And after becoming the seventh
consecutive first-time Sonoma race winner and ninth different victor there in
as many races, the normally soft-spoken Truex was overcome with emotion.
“I tried to cue the radio once and I
couldn’t even talk,” said Truex afterward. “I was a mess, it was terrible. I
had to stop doing doughnuts because I couldn’t think about what I was doing.
“I calmed down a little bit and made
sure I took my time coming back, because at Dover it all happened way too fast.
You never know when you’re going to get that opportunity again.”
Sunday’s win boosted Truex back into
the Top-10 in championship points, the latest surge in his rollercoaster
pursuit of a spot in the 2013 Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup. A 24th-place
showing in the season opener at Daytona combined with a 36th the following
week in Phoenix to put the NAPA Toyota team into a deep early hole. They didn’t
crack the Top-10 in the championship standings until Charlotte in May, and recent
rough outings at Dover and Pocono wiped out that progress, dropping them once
again to 17th in the standings.
Now, Truex hopes he has turned the
tide for good, allowing him and his Michael Waltrip Racing team to string
together enough top finishes to make the Chase and contend for the title.
“We have had some very, very tough
breaks,” insisted Truex Sunday. “We could have won three or four races in the
past year and a half, if things had played out differently. Days when you do
everything right and still don’t win, it’s really frustrating. But that’s the
way it goes.
“Today, it played out in our favor,
and I was glad it finally happened.
“Today was our day (and) we're going
to get a bunch of them now. I can tell you that."
I was at Dover in 2007 for his first win. That was cool. I am old enough to be his mother, but I've been a Jersey girl all my life and when a Jersey boy wins....it's the best.
ReplyDeleteAfter he won, I heard someone on his radio say something about Martin being a modified driver from Wall Stadium in New Jersey. Was nice to hear the reference to that track. Spent many a Saturday night in the 70's and 80's watching, now asphalt legends, racing on the high banks of Wall.
Hoping #3 comes real soon. Congrats Martin.
skein? Had to look it up and still don't quite understand it. I am from WV and that wasn't in our dictionary :)
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