BRISTOL, Tenn. — Martin Truex Jr.’s final full-time season in Cup racing won’t end with a championship.
The question is: will it end in victory?
Truex was among four drivers eliminated after Saturday night’s closing race at Bristol Motor Speedway.
Among the drivers eliminated were two former champions (Truex and Brad Keselowski). Truex’s Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Ty Gibbs and Harrison Burton also saw their title hopes extinguished.
Kyle Larson wins landslide victory in Bristol
Kyle Larson led all but 38 laps to win the NASCAR Cup playoff race Saturday night.
Truex finished 24th — his eighth consecutive finish of 20th or lower — and finished 21 points below the cutoff line.
“I’ve gotten used to swallowing my disappointment lately,” Truex said in the pits after the race. “It sucks. We’ve got seven more races to try to finish on a good note with this team and hopefully win a race. That would be awesome.”
Truex was penalized for speeding on Lap 333 of the final stage and was unable to recover as the race went caution-free for the final 163 laps.
Truex said he was 0.09 mph over the pit lane speed limit in one section and that’s what led to the penalty.
“We’re talking about an eighth of an inch in that section,” Truex said of his sixth pit lane speeding penalty, the team’s most this season. “I pushed too hard, I guess.”
Gibbs also had his night spoiled by a pit lane penalty. He stopped after the end of the first stage, which meant he was unable to score points in the second stage. He is 11 points short of qualifying for the second stage.
“The speeding penalty is on me,” Gibbs said after finishing 15th. “We ran the lights so close, and I just overdid it a little bit, I guess. It’s my fault. It’s unfortunate.”
Keselowski and Burton had no problems in the pits. They had other issues that will prevent them from contending for the title.
“We ran as fast as we could, but there was nothing,” Keselowski said after finishing 26th. “We executed what we had to execute in pit lane and took the opportunities we had to take. But we just had to be faster.”
What the drivers said after Kyle Larson won the NASCAR Cup playoff race at Brsitol
Here’s what the drivers had to say after Saturday night’s Cup playoff race at Bristol Motor Speedway.
Burton had to go to the garage after losing power steering, ending his chances of progressing.
“Early in the race the steering started to get heavier and in the last 60 laps it had no assistance at all,” Burton said after his 35th-place finish. “It got to the point where I couldn’t make any corrections and my arms were so tired I couldn’t do any more.”
“It’s a very sad ending, but I’m really proud of our guys. They changed the bracket very quickly and put in a new pump. We gained a few spots because of guys who ran out of steam. We didn’t give up, but it’s obviously a frustrating ending.”
