martin truex jr Tag

By Brant James, NASCAR Wire Service Crew chief Cole Pearn spent the first 35 races of the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series season watching driver Martin Truex Jr. amass a bevy of insurance through playoff and stage points with his series-high seven victories. All that security is gone now, as the Furniture Row Racing team that has been the standard for the garage enters the finale on Sunday at Homestead-Miami Speedway in a four-car showdown for the championship. All Truex Jr. has to do is finish better than three formerRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service AVONDALE, Ariz. – The middle-aged man without a ride for 2018 drove a dagger through the heart of the youngster expected to shine in the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series for years to come. With nine laps left in Sunday’s Can-Am 500 at Phoenix Raceway, 45-year-old Matt Kenseth passed 21-year-old Chase Elliott for the lead and pulled away to win for the first time since the July 2016 New Hampshire race, breaking a 51-event winless string. Kenseth’s victory, the 39th of his career, deprived ElliottRead More

Listen to “Drafting The Circuits November 09, 2017” on Spreaker. Frank Santorski and the Drafting the Circuits gang – Gray Warren, Richard Youden and Seth Eggert – weighs in on NASCAR at Texas, makes predictions for the final spot in the championship four, has a healthy discussion about the economics of the sport, and looks at the open F1 seat at Williams for 2018. Credits: Host – Frank Santoroski DTC Panel – Seth Eggert, Gray Warren, & Richard Youden Producers – Anthony Arnold & Keith Hayes Special thanks to Whoobazoo for hosting the DTC Podcast.Read More

By David Morgan, NASCAR Editor The Round of Eight all comes down to this. After last week’s race at Texas, the stage is set for the final race of the round in Phoenix to determine which drivers will move onto Homestead and which drivers will see their championship hopes vanish in the Arizona desert. Phoenix has resided on the Cup Series schedule since 1988, but the track looks completely different than it did 29 years ago, having undergone a reconfiguration back in 2011. The reconfiguration added progressive banking to theRead More

By David Morgan, NASCAR Editor Each week, NASCAR Editor David Morgan will break down who’s hot and who’s not after the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series race weekend. Today, we break down the AAA Texas 500 at Texas Motor Speedway. WINNERS Kevin Harvick – Harvick served notice to the rest of the field on Sunday that he wouldn’t be going quietly into the night in this year’s championship battle. Entering Texas with just a three point lead over the elimination cut-off and never having won at the 1.5 mile track,Read More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service FORT WORTH, Tex. – Martin Truex Jr. isn’t invincible after all. Kevin Harvick put a serious dent in Truex’s sense of invulnerability on Sunday afternoon, passing Truex with nine laps left in the AAA Texas 500 at Texas Motor Speedway and pulling away to win by 1.580 seconds. In beating this year’s unrivaled master of the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series’ 1.5-mile intermediate speedways, Harvick earned a spot in the Nov. 19 Championship 4 race at Homestead-Miami Speedway, which Harvick won the first titleRead More

By David Morgan, NASCAR Editor After a barn burner of a finish at Martinsville last weekend, the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series heads to the Lone Star State and Texas Motor Speedway for Sunday’s running of the AAA Texas 500 and the second race of the playoff semi-finals. First joining the circuit in 1997, the 1.5 mile Texas track has provided some great racing over the years as the surface wore down as each season passed. For the second time the season, drivers will get a crack at the trackRead More

By David Morgan, NASCAR Editor Each week, NASCAR Editor David Morgan will break down who’s hot and who’s not after the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series race weekend. Today, we break down the First Data 500 at Martinsville Speedway. WINNERS Kyle Busch – There was only one driver that was truly happy after Sunday’s race at Martinsville and that was Kyle Busch, who won for the fifth time this season and punched his ticket to the championship race at Homestead. Busch would lead for 184 laps on the day, butRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service MARTINSVILLE, Va. – The sun went down, the new lights came on, and all hell broke loose at Martinsville Speedway. In a wild overtime finish that took Sunday’s First Data 500 to 505 laps at the .526-mile short track, Kyle Busch beat Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series leader Martin Truex Jr. to the stripe by .141 seconds to take the checkered flag and earn a spot in the Nov. 19 Championship 4 race at Homestead-Miami Speedway. As Busch crossed the finish line, a multi-car wreckRead More

By David Morgan, NASCAR Editor After a trip out to America’s Heartland, the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series heads back east this weekend and straight to the final short track race of the season, with Sunday’s running of the First Data 500 at Martinsville Speedway. A mainstay on the schedule since 1949, the historic half-mile, which is also the smallest on the circuit, will test both man and machine over 500 grueling laps. Sunday’s race will mark the start of the three-race playoff semi-finals that will trim the eight driverRead More