Martin Truex Jr. embraces underdog role

Martin Truex Jr.‘s tweet fit fell well within Twitter’s 140-character maximum, but the meaning far exceeded its brevity.

“Most don’t see us. We’re still here,” he posted on the social media site Monday.

The driver for Furniture Row Racing, a single-car team based in Denver, of all places, and not in NASCAR’s North Carolina hub, was projected by some to be among the first wave of eliminations in the Chase for the Sprint Cup playoff.

Thus far Truex is defying expectation, however. By a margin of 16 points, he advanced comfortably out of the Chase’s first three-race segment, a fate six-time series champion Jimmie Johnson couldn’t eschew.

And Truex began Round 2 with a strong third-place finish in last Sunday’s race at Charlotte Motor Speedway, while title contenders Kyle Busch (finished 20th), Dale Earnhardt Jr. (28th) and Matt Kenseth (42nd) all fell into a considerable points deficit that will likely require they either win Sunday at Kansas Speedway or Oct. 25 at Talladega Superspeedway to remain in the Chase.

“I think it’s kind of neat,” Truex said Friday at Kansas. “If you look at it, we are an underdog. I’ve never finished in the top 10 in points. We’ve got a rookie crew chief and a single car team in Denver. There are a lot of things that make us an underdog. We’re a small team.”

Truex’s contention that he’s an underdog isn’t a misnomer. Furniture Row doesn’t have the same abundant resources as NASCAR’s major teams and relies on a technical alliance with Richard Childress Racing to help overcome its shortcomings.

But on the track it’s been hard to discern that Truex and Furniture Row don’t belong among powerhouses like Joe Gibbs Racing and Stewart-Haas Racing this season. Truex began the year with 14 top-10s in the first 15 races, including a breakthrough victory in June at Pocono Raceway, and never ranked lower than seventh in points during the regular season.

“I think we don’t get enough credit for what we’ve done this year,” Truex said. “But at the same time, we don’t have that past history or that track record in the Chase or in championship battles. So, I think it’s fair; but I think it’s kind of a fun position for us to be in.

“The only pressure we have is what we put on ourselves. We know what we’re capable of, and if we fall short of that we’re going to be disappointed. There’s no outside pressure. We don’t have to worry about what anybody else really says or thinks about it.”

If there is a prime opportunity for Truex to snatch the spotlight away from the big guys -- JGR, which has seen its four drivers combined to win 13 of 30 races; defending Sprint Cup champion Kevin Harvick; and Joey Logano, who owns four victories including last week at Charlotte -- Kansas presents that chance.

In May, Truex led a race-high 95 laps and may have won if first-year crew chief Cole Pearn hadn’t made the misguided call to forgo tires on Truex’s final pit stop and take fuel only. Truex finished ninth.

“We qualified well and were fast all throughout practice and had a really great race,” Truex said. “Then, it came down to pit strategy and tire strategy calls that kind of took us out of the running for that win.”

Sunday, Truex can gain some measure of redemption, but also a victory would assure he continues in the Chase for another round.

“I really feel good about coming back here, we’ve made some really good progress on our race cars since (May),” Truex said. “I think this will be a great weekend for us.”