Truex Continues to Dominate, Wins at Charlotte

Originally written for CLNS Media.

Martin Truex Jr. won the Bank of America 500 from Charlotte Motor Speedway on Sunday afternoon for his sixth victory of the season.

Truex led 91 laps on Sunday on his way to victory lane, but had to hold off Chase Elliott and Kevin Harvick in the closing laps after two late cautions set up an overtime finish.

Truex said his team came through in the clutch with fast pit stops at the end of the race.

Mike Comer/Getty Images

“Everybody on this team is amazing,” Truex said.  “The pit crew was flawless; got us track position and we were able to keep it.”

Final practice was cancelled on Saturday due to rain, so teams had very little on-track time to prepare for Sunday’s race.  After qualifying 17th, Truex and crew chief Cole Pearn had no following track time to work on their car.

Truex said he and his crew chief did a good job working on the car to prepare it for Sunday.

“It’s one of those weekends with a lot of pressure,” Truex said.  “We qualified poorly, and I was mad about it and Cole was mad about it.”

“This time of year you want to click on all cylinders, and today we did.  We just did everything right with no mistakes.  We just never gave up on it, and we just kept digging.”

Harvick finished third after challenging late for the lead, but he couldn’t catch Truex on the final restart.

Harvick said his car was good, but that he couldn’t compete with how fast Truex was.

“It’s about where we were going to run, second or third,” Harvick said.  “I would get close and then I would get loose…kind of lost what I had at the beginning of the race.”

Unofficial results:

1. Martin Truex Jr.

2. Chase Elliott

3. Kevin Harvick

4. Denny Hamlin

5. Jamie McMurray

6. Daniel Suarez

7. Jimmie Johnson

8. Ryan Blaney

9. Kasey Kahne

10. Kyle Larson

11. Matt Kenseth

12. Dale Earnhardt Jr.

13. Ricky Stenhouse Jr.

14. Trevor Bayne

15. Brad Keselowski

16. Austin Dillon

17. Erik Jones

18. Chris Buescher

19. Paul Menard

20. AJ Allmendinger

21. Ty Dillon

22. Kurt Busch

23. Matt DiBenedetto

24. Aric Almirola

25. Landon Cassill

26. Joey Logano

27. Clint Bowyer

28. Corey LaJoie

29. Kyle Busch

30. Jeffrey Earnhardt

31. Reed Sorenson

32. BJ McLeod

33. Timmy Hill

34. Cole Whitt

35. Michael McDowell

36. Gray Gaulding

37. David Ragan

38. Danica Patrick

39. Brett Moffitt

40. Ryan Newman

Jared C. Tilton/Getty Images