Truex Cruises to Victory in the Windy City

Martin Truex Jr. took the lead not long after the start of the final stage and it was smooth sailing from there, as he drove on to score the victory in the Tales of the Turtles 400 at Chicagoland Speedway.

The only speed bump he dealt with was an early speeding penalty, but he overcame that, took the lead from Kevin Harvick entering Turn 3 on Lap 190 and drove on to win for the 12th time in 432 career Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series starts.

“Awe yeah! This is awesome man,” Truex shouted in jubilation while grabbing Rutledge Wood, standing at the start/finish line. “So excited! This is the playoffs. This is what it’s all about. This team, my team is unbelievable. Thank all the fans for coming out. We love coming to Chicago. So proud of everybody.

“The speeding penalty, I was like ‘Oh no. Here we go again.’ After last year, we’ve got to come from the back. But the car was amazing. We just kept our heads down and kept digging and fighting and just do what we always do, and here we are.”

Chase Elliott finished second and Harvick rounded out the podium.

“Yeah, just a huge step in the right direction. Days like this are the days we are going to have to have,” Elliott said. “There is no way around that. I thought we had a solid day overall. Our car drove good, it had pace, our pit stops were good. I didn’t have anything for Martin. I thought we made the most of our day without some luck I wasn’t going to get around him unless we had a late-race restart or something. I had a solid day and frankly, it is a lot better than we have been doing and we’ve got to have days like this to keep moving forward.”

Harvick said after the race that having a “flawless” race “really wasn’t our focus today.”

“Our focus was to make sure that we didn’t make any mistakes today and everybody at Stewart-Haas Racing worked hard to work on that gap between those cars, but we’ve known about that gap and feel like we’ve closed that up and we knew that not making mistakes was gonna go a long way,” Harvick said. “We saw the 78 made mistakes today, but they had a fast enough car to recover from that. The 18 (Kyle Busch) didn’t recover from his mistakes.”

Denny Hamlin and Kyle Larson rounded out the top-five.

Brad Keselowski, Joey Logano, Jimmie Johnson, Matt Kenseth and Jamie McMurray rounded out the top-10.

RACE SUMMARY

Kyle Busch led the field to the green flag at 3:08 p.m. He led all but two laps of the first stage, which were led by Landon Cassill, on his way to winning it.

Harvick powered by Busch’s outside on the Lap 88 restart, exiting Turn 2, to take the race lead. He controlled the race, until he pitted on Lap 124. Chase Elliott, who pitted the same lap, exited the pits ahead of Harvick, cycled to the lead and won the second stage.

Harvick took it back from Elliott, exiting Turn 2, on the Lap 168 restart, moments before Jamie McMurray spun out on the backstretch, setting up the run to the finish.

CAUTION SUMMATION

Caution flew for the first time on Lap 80 for the end of the first stage. The second caution came out on Lap 160 for the end of the second stage. McMurray’s spin on Lap 169 caused the third caution. The fourth and final caution flew on Lap 210 when Erik Jones suffered a right-rear tire blowout and spun out in Turn 4.

HAPPENINGS

Ricky Stenhouse Jr. slid up and hit the outside wall in Turn 2 on Lap 26, but continued on. Six drivers — Austin Dillon, Stenhouse, Matt DiBenedetto, Jones, Truex and Corey LaJoie — were busted for speeding during the first green flag pit stop cycle.

NUTS & BOLTS

The race lasted two hours, 45 minutes and 16 seconds, at an average speed of 145.401 mph. There were 12 lead changes among seven different drivers and four cautions for 21 laps.

Truex leaves with a 27-point lead over Larson. Kurt Busch, Stenhouse Kasey Kahne and Ryan Newman occupy the elimination spots.

C1727_UNOFFRES

The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of SpeedwayMedia.com

Tucker White
Tucker White
I've followed NASCAR for well over 20 years of my life, both as a fan and now as a member of the media. As of 2024, I'm on my ninth season as a traveling NASCAR beat writer. For all its flaws and dumb moments, NASCAR at its best produces some of the best action you'll ever see in the sport of auto racing. Case in point: Kyle Larson's threading the needle pass at Darlington Raceway on May 9, 2021. On used-up tires, racing on a worn surface and an aero package that put his car on the razor's edge of control, Larson demonstrated why he's a generational talent. Those are the stories I want to capture and break down. In addition to NASCAR, I also follow IndyCar and Formula 1. As a native of Knoxville, Tennessee, and a graduate of the University of Tennessee, I'm a diehard Tennessee Volunteers fan (especially in regards to Tennessee football). If covering NASCAR doesn't kill me, down the road, watching Tennessee football will. I'm also a diehard fan of the Atlanta Braves, and I lived long enough to see them win a World Series for the first time since 1995 (when I was just a year old). I've also sworn my fan allegiance to the Nashville Predators, though that's not paid out as much as the Braves. Furthermore, as a massive sports dork, I follow the NFL on a weekly basis. Though it's more out of an obligation than genuine passion (for sports dorks, following the NFL is basically an unwritten rule). Outside of sports, I'm a major cinema buff and a weeb. My favorite film is "Blazing Saddles" and my favorite anime is "Black Lagoon."

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