Plagued with rear-side damage to his No. 78 Furniture Row/Denver Mattress Chevrolet, Martin Truex Jr. held on to post a ninth-place finish in Sunday night’s Bojangles’ Southern 500 at Darlington Raceway.
The result was Truex’s 17th top-10 finish in the first 25 races, which set a team record for most top-10s in a season. The previous team record of 16 top 10s in a season was set by Kurt Busch in 2013.
“We lost the handling late in the race and went backwards,” said Truex, “We were a top-five car all night and to come away ninth is disappointing. We just didn’t have the grip at the end to run closer to the front. I would feel better about the team record had we finished in the top-five.”
Truex ran as high as second in the 367 lapper that saw a track record 18 cautions. With 60 laps remaining he was solidly running in fourth place but when he made his final pit stop following a lap 355 caution, he was positioned in 10th place.
“We were in a survival mode at that stage of the race and managed to get one position back,” noted Truex, whose teal-accented car raised awareness for ovarian cancer. “There are times when you’re ok with a top-10, but not tonight.”
Truex remains sixth in driver points with one race remaining before the start of the 10-race Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup.
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