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  • Harvick wins AAA Texas 500, will race for championship in Miami

    Harvick wins AAA Texas 500, will race for championship in Miami

    Kevin Harvick had the dominant car at Texas Motor Speedway on Sunday night, leading 119 laps from the pole and winning his third-straight AAA Texas 500 for a spot in the championship round at Homestead-Miami Speedway. Harvick held off Stewart-Haas Racing teammate Aric Almirola at the checkered by 1.594-seconds.

    “Our car was just so fast through [Turns] 3 and 4, as long as I could keep my momentum up, I could get up beside [Almirola],” Harvick said of his late-race battle with his teammate. “So it was definitely fast, and speed made up for our Ducks Unlimited Busch Beer Ford Mustang in what we lacked a little bit in our handling.”

    Fellow SHR driver Daniel Suarez finished third after leading 25 laps.

    “That was a very solid night, and I’m very happy with the performance and speed that we brought from the shop,” said Suarez. “Everyone back at the shop did a great job. We knew we would be fast here.

    “We had a solid perfomance here last time. We did a good job. We had good execution and a good clean day. I’m very happy for Stewart-Haas Racing and the No. 41 Ford Mustang was pretty sporty. I am very happy for Kevin getting his ticket for Homestead.”

    Playoff driver Joey Logano finished fourth and Alex Bowman rounded out the top-five. Playoff drivers Martin Truex Jr., Kyle Busch, and Ryan Blaney finished sixth through eighth, with Kurt Busch and Erik Jones rounding out the top-10.

    Playoff driver Kyle Larson had a quiet day as well, finishing in 12th after starting 13th.

    The race was slowed 11 times for 56 laps, with Playoff drivers Chase Elliott and Denny Hamlin finding trouble with the wall or the frontstretch grass early in Stage One. Elliott would finish 32nd, several laps off the pace, while Hamlin would finish six laps down in 28th, despite winning at TMS in March.

    Seven-time Texas winner Jimmie Johnson also found the wall after leading 40 laps. The No. 48 was running in second when he spun off the second turn and slapped the wall, relegating his Hendrick Motorsports team to a 34th-place finish.

    There were 26 lead changes among 11 drivers, with 2,957 green flag passes (10.6 per green flag lap).

    The next race will be at ISM Raceway for the Bluegreen Vacations 500, the final race in the Round of Eight. The race will air on NBC at 2:30 p.m. ET and will also be streaming on MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Channel 90 and the NBC Sports app.

  • Harvick wins pole for AAA Texas 500, Jones to start second

    Harvick wins pole for AAA Texas 500, Jones to start second

    Kevin Harvick wheeled his No. 4 Stewart-Haas Racing Ford Mustang to a 28.465-second lap at 189.707 mph around the Texas Motor Speedway to earn the pole for Sunday’s AAA Texas 500. The pole was Harvick’s second at the speedway in 34 races and sixth overall of 2019.

    “I think the key to the lap was knowing that you had to be wide open and kind of did a halfway qualifying run yesterday and worked most of the day on race runs and making sure we ran enough laps to know where our car was,” said Harvick.

    Joe Gibbs Racing driver Erik Jones put his No. 20 Toyota on the outside of Row 1 with a lap of 28.588 at 188.890 mph. Denny Hamlin, Kurt Busch, and Alex Bowman rounded out the top-five.

    Harvick and Hamlin were the only Playoff drivers to qualify in the top-10, as the other six drivers in the Round of 8 will start in the top-20. Joey Logano will start 11th, with a lap of 28.755 seconds, while Kyle Busch will start on the outside of Row 6 with a lap of 28.764 seconds.

    Kyle Larson, Chase Elliott, and Ryan Blaney will start in positions 13-15, while Martin Truex Jr. will be starting from the 17th spot with a lap of 28.863.

    The AAA Texas 500 at Texas Motor Speedway will start at 2 p.m. CT on NBCSN/SiriusXM Channel 90.

  • Despite Admitting Error, NASCAR Needs To Overhaul Tech Procedures

    Despite Admitting Error, NASCAR Needs To Overhaul Tech Procedures

    Despite admitting wrongdoing to Jimmie Johnson by penalizing him for failing tech inspection three times when he only failed twice, the fact remains that the call to overhaul NASCAR inspection penalties is getting louder. Although the issue was more of a communication error, there’s no glossing over the fact that the system of failing three times before being penalized is pointless and without solid reasoning.

    “I still don’t understand why we have to worry about failing three times,” said Tony Stewart, winning car owner of the No. 4 of Kevin Harvick. “It’s like, you bring your car and bring it through tech, and you either pass or you don’t.”

    “I don’t know why we screw around, jack around one, two, three times, and it’s ridiculous to me. It’s the only series in the world where you get to go through tech three times and you fail twice and they still let you go a third time. We got to figure it out and make it simpler and it shouldn’t be this difficult.

    “Half the time you don’t even know what the penalty is supposed to be, and I don’t…I’m a car owner and I don’t know what the penalty is supposed to be. I don’t know how the fans can keep up with it either. If you start rolling cars through and they don’t pass and you send them to the back after one time I guarantee you a lot less cars fail tech the next week.”

    Stewart’s words illustrate a common idea regarding the tech inspection process. Granted, the idea of giving cars three chances through tech inspection is meant to be lenient and easier on the drivers. However, a communication error would be easier and more avoidable if the process was limited to just one chance at tech inspection.

    Allowing three passes at tech inspection allows a chance for communication to be needlessly tangled such as what happened with Johnson prior to the AAA Texas 500. It is true that the penalty didn’t harm Johnson too terribly; he had a disastrous qualifying effort by the 48 team’s standards (having won seven races at Texas), and the penalty barely moved him further down in the field. But the next time such an error happens it could happen to a Playoff driver in a cutoff event and it’s obvious NASCAR doesn’t want to have another 2013 Chase field fiasco.

    Johnson finished 15th at the final running order despite having led briefly due to pit strategy.

    “There was a breakdown of communication on how teams can communicate to the tower to dispute something, and it was really exposed today,” said Johnson.

    It’s apparent that without the option to go through tech three times, such a “communication breakdown” wouldn’t have even happened.

  • Harvick Wins Texas, Will Make Appearance in Championship Round

    Harvick Wins Texas, Will Make Appearance in Championship Round

    FORT WORTH, Texas — Kevin Harvick punched his ticket to the Championship Round in Miami by dominating Sunday’s AAA Texas 500 at Texas Motor Speedway, leading 177 laps and outrunning pole winner Ryan Blaney by 0.447 seconds.

    Joey Logano finished third, with Erik Jones and Kyle Larson rounding out the top-five. Chase Elliott, Kurt Busch, Aric Almirola, Martin Truex Jr., and Austin Dillon rounded out the top-10.

    Blaney spoke about his second-place finish, saying. “We got by the 4 on that one restart but I just couldn’t hold him off. He was really good. I kind of missed one and two by an inch and he took advantage of it. We needed to be mistake free and then some and I just couldn’t be that.

    “Then we had another shot at it. The last one, he took the top, like I knew he was going to and he motored around me. It was a strong showing by our Carlisle team. I thought we were a second-place car all night really. I thought the 4 was head and shoulders above everyone else but I thought we were second best for sure. That was a fun race for sure.”

    Third-place Logano also commented on the dominance of Harvick and the Ford teams.

    “We had a top-five car. We got out front where we could lead laps for a little bit and just when the front tires would give up that is when the 4 was just stellar. He was stupid fast. He was able to do a lot. Congrats to them. That is two Fords in and two to go.”

    The win was Harvick’s 45th career Cup Series win and his second-straight in the fall event at TMS. With this win, Harvick’s appearance at Miami will be his fourth in five years, since the inception of the playoff system in 2014, the year he won his first championship.

    ”Really, that’s what we race for,” said Harvick on his run to Miami. “You try to get yourself in position to get into the Playoffs and position yourself to have a chance at getting to Homestead.”

    ”It’s not easy at this time of year just because of the fact that everybody is throwing everything that they have at it, all the notes and all the things that you’ve done all year all piled into the cars that you have on the race track. But it’s enough to win races at this point of the year and to get to Victory Lane and that’s our goal.”

    Harvick celebrated his win on the track with a young fan, celebrating with him by taking a selfie before handing him the checkered flag.

    ”I thought about taking him to Victory Lane with me, but I realized his parents wouldn’t know where he was at,” said Harvick in the Media Center to a roomful of laughter.

    Harvick is also the winningest driver at ISM Raceway, where he’ll be able to take a breath next weekend before racing for his second title at Homestead on November 18.

     

  • Almirola Upset after Contact with Logano at Texas

    Almirola Upset after Contact with Logano at Texas

    FORT WORTH, Texas — Hard feelings were had following the AAA Texas 500 when eighth-place finisher Aric Almirola had harsh words for third-place finisher Joey Logano after contact between the two pushed Almirola out of the top-five.

    “We worked diligently all day to get to the front and finally got ourselves in position to at least have a shot,” said Almirola. “then the 22 just put it right on my door and about wrecked us both.”

    “I don’t have to talk to him but he just continues to make things harder on himself. If that’s the way he wants to race me when he’s already locked into Homestead and we’re out here fighting for our lives, that’s fine. When Homestead cones around, if I’m not in, he’ll know it.”

    When asked how far he’d be willing to take things with the 22, Almirola was clear he’d make it difficult on the Penske driver when Homestead arrives on the schedule.

    “I’m fired up. Let’s go.”

    While Logano is currently locked into the Championship round in Miami, Almirola goes into ISM Raceway in a must-win situation as he sits seventh on the Playoff grid. He holds an average finish of 16.3 at ISM Raceway despite finishing seventh there in the Spring.

    The final race in the Round of Eight will be the Can-Am 500 at ISM Raceway on November 11. The four contenders for the championship round at Homestead on November 18 will be decided following this race.

     

  • Truex Locks Into Title Race with Runner-up Finish at Texas

    Truex Locks Into Title Race with Runner-up Finish at Texas

    While Martin Truex Jr. didn’t win the AAA Texas 500 at Texas Motor Speedway, his runner-up finish — and points he amassed through the course of the day, via stage finishes — secured him a spot in the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Championship 4 race at Homestead-Miami Speedway.

    Much of Truex’s day was uneventful. Starting seventh, he drove his No. 78 Furniture Row Racing Toyota to a runner-up finish in the first stage and fourth in the second stage. It wasn’t until the Lap 187 restart — following Landon Cassill’s spin in Turn 1 on Lap 180 — that he first took the race lead, usurping it from Matt Kenseth.

    Truex gave up the lead to pit under green on Lap 225, and it most likely would’ve cycled back to him if a caution, for Michael McDowell spinning in Turn 2, on Lap 234 didn’t interrupt it.

    He regained the lead on the restart that followed Ray Black Jr.’s spin on Lap 242, once again taking it from Kenseth.

    Everybody hit pit road on Lap 270, after Black brought out another caution, and Denny Hamlin beat Truex off pit road.

    After a 10-minute, 29-second red flag following Kyle Larson’s wreck in Turn 1 with 51 laps to go, the race went back green for the final time with 46 to go. By the time the field left Turn 2, Truex had the lead.

    With 27 to go, Kevin Harvick took second from Hamlin and Truex ran into lap traffic, allowing Harvick to eat away at the one-second gap. With 20 to go, Harvick was less than half a second back of Truex.

    Clean air allowed Truex to stay in front of Harvick for a few laps, but running into another group of lapped cars with 10 to go gave Harvick the opening he needed to pull up to him in Turn 1, alongside him on the outside exiting Turn 2 and take the lead entering Turn 3.

    “[On] the long runs I would get really lose getting into the corners,” Truex said. “As the runs went, I would get looser and looser. Wasn’t much I could do about it. I could hold my own in clean air. As soon as I caught lap cars, I would get loose getting in the corner. We ran up on the 6 (Trevor Bayne) and somebody else racing each other, took up the whole racetrack. I went into (Turn) 1 and started chattering rear tires, chasing it up the hill. Harvick followed me and got loose with me. Somehow got to my right rear corner, got outside me, just carrying that momentum.

    “I thought when we went in there and we both started sliding up, I was going to be okay. He got to my outside and was just faster at the end. Once he got in front of us, he was just gone. Nothing I could do. Just one of those deals where he was quicker. Got me in a bad spot, took advantage, and he was gone.”

    Truex couldn’t muster up a counterattack, as Harvick pulled away to a two-second lead by the time he took the checkered flag, and brought his car home to second.

    “It was an up‑and‑down day for our Bass Pro Toyota,” he said. “Doing what we need to do. Just proud of everybody. We fought hard all day. It was a tough race. Track was slick.

    “At the start of the race, our car wasn’t very good. Track position was a big part of this race. We fought the car, we fought track position. We got the lead, led some laps. Ultimately at the end we weren’t as good as we needed to be to win.”

    While Truex came up short, his runner-up garnered him enough points to mathematically clinch a spot in the Championship 4 in two weeks time at Homestead-Miami Speedway, thanks to leaving Texas 57 points ahead of Brad Keselowski.

    “It feels great. It feels amazing – that’s what we set out to do this year was to make it to Homestead and fight for the title and we feel like we’re right there. I just can’t wait to get there and get back to work,” Truex added. “I wish we could have won today, it would have been a little sweeter going and locking it up in victory lane, but we were off a little bit there at the end.”

  • Harvick Runs Down Truex to Win at Texas

    Harvick Runs Down Truex to Win at Texas

    Kevin Harvick punched his Championship 4 ticket to Homestead-Miami Speedway after chasing down and passing Martin Truex Jr. in the waning laps to win the AAA Texas 500 at Texas Motor Speedway.

    Restarting with 46 laps to go, Truex took the lead from Denny Hamlin and set sail. But Harvick took second from Hamlin and, thanks to lap traffic, cut the gap down to under half a second with under 20 to go.

    While clean air stalled Harvick’s advance for a few laps, another group of lapped cars allowed him to close up to Truex going into Turn 1, pull up alongside him exiting Turn 2 and pass him for the lead going into Turn 3.

    He pulled away to score his 37th career Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series victory in his 608th career start.

    “First thing I want to do is thank all these fans in Texas. I’m happy to finally get to victory lane here (Texas Motor Speedway). It’s been a long time coming. I’m really proud of everybody at Stewart-Haas Racing and our Mobil 1 Ford, but damn it’s good to be in victory lane here at Texas! Just really want to thank all my guys. I knew I had a really good car and I knew I had to do something different. I started driving it into Turn 1 just a whole lot deeper. I saw the 42 (Kyle Larson) doing that early in the race. I was just afraid I didn’t have the brakes to continue to do that all day. I waited till the end and it was able to get on the outside of Martin. I got him loose as I brushed across the back, I think. Was able to get on the outside and my car was pretty good on the outside down there.”

    Truex finished second and Hamlin rounded out the podium.

    “I knew he (Harvick) was quicker – once he got around the 11 (Hamlin) I guess it was, he started coming really fast and that’s all I had,” Truex said. “Just struggled a little on the long run today, which was normally where we’re our best. He seemed to be better when he got out front – we were good when we got out front toward the middle of the race and we just got too loose in those long runs. I did all I could do on the inside, but we had the 6 (Trevor Bayne) and some other dummy racing side-by-side in front of us and I was way loose in traffic and I got loose going into one and Harvick jumped to my outside. One of those deals, I think we could have held them off on a clean race track, but the 6 car is in the damn way every week – that’s pretty normal.”

    “Really had a solid car all day long,” Hamlin said. “We lost some track position there when a couple guys took two tires, we took four. Then we had a bad restart, and that kind of took us back in the pack 10th, 12th or so. 18 pitted long, tracked us a lap down, then that kind of hurt us a little bit. We just fought back to fourth, I think it was, drove back up to fourth, then it was an easy decision to take two tires there. It was the only way we were going to get out front and hopefully win the race. The 78 passed us on that one restart, then the two tires faded, couldn’t hold off the 4 there.”

    Matt Kenseth and Brad Keselowski rounded out the top-five.

    “First run of the day was fun,” Kenseth said. “Everybody was on three-cycle scuffs and we were on stickers. We got to the end, we had a good car when we got to get up through there pretty quick, but just got tight on that last set of tires for some reason and then I would just – I’d always draw the outside lane on a restart and lose a couple spots. It’s just hard to overcome that. That was our worst run of the day and it was still pretty competitive, so it was nice to be competitive.”

    “We had a pretty good car. Something happened on lap one and basically we started the race last and a lap-and-a-half down. That cost us a bunch of stage points, but we rallied with a solid effort to get back to fifth. I’m happy for that,” Keselowski said.

    Ryan Blaney, Joey Logano, Chase Elliott, Kurt Busch and Erik Jones rounded out the top-10.

    RACE SUMMARY

    Kurt Busch led the field to the green flag at 2:19 p.m., but didn’t lead the first lap — or a lap all day — because Hamlin powered by him on the outside exiting Turn 2 to lead the first lap. He led the first 46, before pulling to the high-side and allowing Larson to drive by in Turn 3 to take the lead.

    Larson surrendered the lead for 10 laps during a cycle of green flag stops, before it cycled back to him. A few laps later, however, he got loose exiting Turn 2, which allowed Harvick to pull up and pass him to take the lead on Lap 69.

    Harvick then went on to win the first stage on Lap 85.

    Hamlin, who exited the pits under the first stage break with the race lead, led the field back to green on Lap 92. Harvick, who initially got a poor restart, powered off Turn 2 and drove past Hamlin down the backstretch to retake the lead. After caution flew for a two-car spin in Turn 2 on Lap 93, Harvick led the field back to green on Lap 99, only to lose the lead to Larson going into Turn 3.

    Like the first cycle of green flag stops, Larson briefly lost the lead whilst pitting and regained it when it concluded. This time, however, it didn’t end with another driver passing him a few laps later. He kept the lead and drove on to win the second stage on Lap 170.

    Kenseth, who was off-sequence from the leaders, led the field back to green on Lap 179. He lost it to Truex on the Lap 187 restart, that followed Landon Cassill’s spin in Turn 2 on Lap 180.

    The ensuing cycle of green flag stops that started on Lap 225 was interrupted by a caution for Michael McDowell spinning in Turn 2. Kyle Busch, who was in the lead at the time, pitted and the lead cycled back to Truex.

    Kenseth took back the lead on the Lap 239 restart, Truex took it back on the Lap 246 restart and Hamlin exited pit road under the Lap 270 caution with the race lead.

    Larson’s wreck in Turn 1 brought out the eighth caution of the race and set up the run to the finish.

    CAUTION SUMMATION

    The first caution flew on Lap 85 for the end of the first stage. Caution flew for the second time for a two-car wreck in Turn 2 on Lap 93, involving Daniel Suarez and Kasey Kahne. Caution flew for the third time on Lap 170 for the conclusion of the second stage. The fourth caution flew when Cassill spun out in Turn 1 on Lap 180. McDowell’s spin in Turn 2 on Lap 234 brought out the fifth caution. Ray Black Jr. brought out the sixth and seventh caution’s for spins in Turn 2 (the latter collected Jeffrey Earnhardt). The final flew when Larson spun out and slammed the outside wall in Turn 1 with 51 to go.

    NUTS & BOLTS

    The race lasted three hours, 29 minutes and 52 seconds, at an average speed of 143.234 mph. There were 27 lead changes among 13 different drivers, and eight cautions for 40 laps.

    Truex leaves with a 50-point lead over Kyle Busch. Hamlin, Blaney Elliott and Jimmie Johnson leave in the Round of 8 drop zone.

  • Strong Run Cut Short for Pole Winner Dillon

    Strong Run Cut Short for Pole Winner Dillon

    Despite having the fastest car in qualifying for Sunday’s AAA Texas 500 at Texas Motor Speedway, polesitter Austin Dillon ended the night in 37th following a hard multi-car accident on the frontstretch. Dillon, who won the pole with a lap of 28.081 seconds (at 192.301 mph), led the first six laps, which were run under a green/yellow start.

    Despite hanging in the top-10 for most of the night, on lap 264 Dillon’s No. 3 Chevy was hooked by the No. 4 of Kevin Harvick coming off of Turn 4 while the two were battling for the fifth position. Dillon’s Chevy was launched into the wall, and the ensuing melee also took out the No. 44 of Brian Scott and the No. 13 of Casey Mears, who took the most damage when he slid into the frontstretch grass.

    “Car was really good. Couldn’t ask for anything more or better,” Dillon told Speedway Media. “We struggled a little bit on pit road, lost some track position. But we got better on restarts and had a good restart but (Harvick) sucked down on my door as tight as he could, got me tight, didn’t check up for me after that, and wrecked me. So that’s all we had.”

    Meanwhile, Harvick was apologetic for the contact, apologizing in his post-race interview to the Richard Childress Racing driver.

    “Just want to apologize to the No. 3,” said Harvick. “He kind of came up there and got loose, and when he checked up I hit him. That wasn’t anything I wanted to see.”

    When told of Dillon’s crew chief Slugger Labbe telling his driver to “mark down Harvick’s number” and that “it was time to get mad,” Harvick appeared to brush off Labbe’s comments.

    “Slugger says a lot of things he shouldn’t,” said Harvick. “There wasn’t any intent there (in the contact). I like racing with Austin. I like everything that they do.”

     

  • Carl Edwards Wins Rain-Shortened AAA Texas 500

    Carl Edwards Wins Rain-Shortened AAA Texas 500

    Carl Edwards took his No. 19 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota to Victory Lane in a rain-shortened AAA Texas 500 at Texas Motor Speedway, after the race’s start was delayed by an almost six-hour rain delay at the beginning of the race. With this win, Edwards becomes the second Chase driver to be added to the Championship Final Four at Homestead, following Jimmie Johnson’s Martinsville win a week ago.

    “This is huge. I don’t think it’s sunk in yet,” an ecstatic Edwards said after the race. “This is cool. This team has really worked hard all year and man, it’s just really cool. That’s all we said we needed was a shot and now we’re going to go to Homestead and we’re going to do what we have to do. This was a great test. We came here and knew what we had to do, we performed the way we needed to and I really believe we can do that at Homestead.”

    Joey Logano, who had the dominant car of the night, was credited with second-place. Logano, who is also in a must-win situation heading into Homestead, had the fastest car of the night after starting second. Logano led 178 laps on the night and appeared to be the car to beat. But after losing the lead to the 78 of Martin Truex Jr. due to pit strategy on Truex’s part, he never regained the lead.

    Logano was disappointed but is looking ahead to next week’s race at Phoenix.

    “The team did a very good job on executing when we needed to,” he said. Just, you know, didn’t have enough laps. It seemed like the momentum swung the other way about three or four laps to go before the caution came out when I started catching the 19 pretty rapidly. Unfortunately, it just started raining. That was the end of the race, so…

    “You know, it is what it is. We’re going to be close. There’s a lot of cars that are going to be close going into Phoenix. It’s going to be entertaining. It’s going to be probably the closest Phoenix race we’ve ever seen as far as points. It’s going to be a fun one, for sure.”

    Truex was credited with third and appeared to be Logano’s biggest challenger of the night, as he led 66 laps. Fourth-place went to Chase Elliott, who despite suffering from flu-like symptoms, managed to run an impressive race and was the top-finishing rookie. Fifth-place went to Kyle Busch, who had a strong run to the front after fading back due to hitting a piece of debris, which punched a hole in the front of his M&M’s Camry.

    Rounding out the top-10 was Kevin Harvick in sixth, Matt Kenseth in seventh, Kasey Kahne in eighth, Denny Hamlin in ninth, and Ryan Newman in 10th. Chase standings heading into Phoenix have the 48 of Johnson and the 19 of Edwards first and second, respectively, with Logano in third and Kyle Busch in fourth. Kenseth, Hamlin, Harvick, and Kurt Busch are in fifth through eighth place.

    Edwards took the lead on lap 258 following a strong pit stop during a caution on lap 257. He never relinquished the lead, and ultimately led 36 laps. This is his third win of 2016, and his 18th top-10 finish of 2016. This is also his fourth win at Texas, winning there in 2005 and also sweeping both 2008 races.

    The Sprint Cup Series heads to Phoenix International Raceway next Sunday, where they will round out the Final Four for Championship Weekend at Homestead-Miami Speedway. The race will air at 3:30 p..m. ET, Sunday, November 13 on NBC.

  • Surprising and Not Surprising: AAA Texas 500

    Surprising and Not Surprising: AAA Texas 500

    From deep in the heart of the Lone Star State, here is what was surprising and not surprising from the 11th annual AAA Texas 500.

    Surprising: There apparently is a new super power in NASCAR called ‘Mega Turn’. At least that was the power bestowed on race winner Jimmie Johnson by runner-up Brad Keselowski.

    “The 48 car had mega turn that last run and I couldn’t keep the turn and it kept pushing real bad,” the driver of the No. 2 Wurth Ford Fusion said. “I did everything I could to hold him off, but he was way faster that last run.”

    “Their team did a hell of a job and found speed and my team did a hell of a job too. We led 300-some laps and these debris yellows always favor someone and it wasn’t our day for them to favor us.”

    “It was a hell of a race.”

    This was Keselowski’s sixth top-10 finish at Texas and his 23rd top-10 finish of the season.

    Not Surprising: Given the fact that rain washed out both Cup practices, the saying ‘When it rains, it pours’ was definitely applicable at Texas, especially for Chase driver Joey Logano. Not only did his tire blow early in the race but one of his crew members had hot oil pour out of the car onto his face, causing him to take a quick trip to the infield care center.

    While the crew member was treated and released, Logano finished 40th and is now solidly in the basement of the Chase race, 69 points behind leader Jeff Gordon.

    “Sometimes you just have to roll with the punches,” the driver of the No. 22 AAA Insurance Ford said. “This team is strong. We didn’t take any wind out of our sails today and we showed how fast this thing was even after we crashed. I am very proud of our team.”

    “It is unfortunate that we finished how we did.”

    Surprising: After a weekend that was not so classy, this week’s race was filled with at least a few moments of class, from Jimmie Johnson racing Brad Keselowski fair and square without incident for the race win to Martin Truex Jr. acknowledging some hard racing with Keselowski with a handshake after the race.

    “I just like to race guys clean anyway, the driver of the No. 48 Lowe’s Chevrolet said of Keselowski. “I kept working on him and working on him. He got real loose off (Turn) 2 and I had a big run off the top and I went for a big slide job down in (Turns) 3 and 4 and got the win.”

    And of the other classy act of the race, here is what eighth place finisher Martin Truex Jr. had to say of his close racing with Brad Keselowski.

    “We just rubbed a little bit there in the tri-oval,” the driver of the No. 78 Furniture Row/Visser Precision Chevrolet said. “No big deal at all. We were both racing hard. Good hard racing-rubbing a little. Rubbing is racing.”

    “It was fun.”

    Not Surprising: Although he is one of the younger drivers on the track, Erik Jones was spent and ready for some respite after running the third race of the weekend in substitution for Matt Kenseth in the No. 20 DeWalt Toyota.

    “I’m ready to take a day off, I don’t think I’ve ever run more than two races – the Truck and XFINITY race – in more than one weekend,” Jones said. “At this point, I’m feeling fine, but I can definitely feel it coming on. I’ll be worn out tonight.”

    “It was a fun weekend and I’ll do it again for sure next weekend. I’m looking forward to it, but it’s definitely busy and definitely hard on you. I’ll take a nice day off tomorrow.”

    Surprising: One would think that having two tires go down, as well as another shifter problem, would definitely have resulted in a near the bottom of the pack finish. Not so for one Kevin Harvick, who rallied back from all that to finish third in his No. 4 Budweiser/Jimmy John’s Chevrolet.

    “I’ve never had to drive with one arm that long,” Harvick said. “I had to pay a lot more attention. The hardest part was my arm started to go to sleep and I had to let off on it to get the blood flowing again.”

    This was Harvick’s 14th top-10 finish in 26 races at Texas Motor Speedway.

    Not Surprising: Even veteran drivers, including one in his last season, can continue to be a student of the sport. Of course, that continuing education is greatly enhanced when that driver is also already guaranteed a spot in the final four of the Championship Chase.

    “I thought we learned a lot this weekend,” Jeff Gordon, driver of the No. 24 Axalta Chevrolet said. “I think we certainly know that our cars are fast because our teammate won. At the same time, I think that we were here to execute and push hard, try to win, but also to just learn what we could. I thought we learned some stuff.”

    “Something good to build on and work on.”

    Surprising: While teammate Jeff Gordon was going to hug his teammate after the win, the two top finishing Toyotas were also actually cheering on competitor Jimmie Johnson for the race win.

    “For our situation, we wanted to see a guy that was not in the Chase win or a guy that we were racing right around us like the 78 (Martin Truex Jr.) and win the race,” Kyle Busch said after finishing fourth. “This M&M’s Crispy Camry was really, really fast today – just not fast enough. We fought hard, we did what we needed to do, we finished in the top-five and we got ourselves in a pretty good spot hopefully.

    “My guys never cheered so hard for Jimmie (Johnson), we needed that for the points going to Homestead,” Carl Edwards said after finishing fifth. “Our Sport Clips Camry – it was fast. It was really fast in the middle of the race. We were up to second and I thought we had something then it fell off at the end.”

    “This was a fun race to drive.”

    Not Surprising: Two drivers had some close encounters with the wall, with both manning up that it was due to driver error.

    “We had a good car and we were driving forward early and I got into the wall off four trying to pass somebody and cut a right front tire down,” Ryan Blaney, driver of the No. 21 SNAP-ON Tools Ford said. “Hit the wall pretty hard in one and two and ruined our day. It is all my fault. I hit the wall all by myself and ruined a very fast race car.”

    “I was having too much fun out there and got loose, three-wide after a restart and tagged the wall real good and bent the car up pretty bad and knocked the rear deck lid off of it,” Dale Earnhardt Jr. said after the race. “We got the chance to fix it and we just had a real fast car. I think we had the best car here. Just can’t hit the wall, but man we were just having fun, running hard. Got to do that every once in a while.”

    Surprising: Brian Scott continues to strut his stuff in the Cup Series. He had another top-15 finish, his second in his limited run in the series, finishing 14th in his No. 33 Shore Lodge Chevrolet. This was the first time in his Cup career that he has scored back to back top-15’s.

    Not Surprising: Demonstrating his dry wit and his own brand of humor yet again, Matt Kenseth won his own race, at least for one of the most re-tweeted Twitter postings after the race.

    “Good work @JimmieJohnson! Textbook pass for the win at the end of the race when someone is trying to take your lane. #quintessential”