Wrong strategy dooms Martin Truex Jr. to 9th-place finish

There wasn’t much a bemused and frustrated Martin Truex Jr. could do but shake his head following Saturday’s SpongeBob Squarepants 400 at Kansas Speedway.

Having led a race-high 95 laps and with clearly the fastest car, Truex appeared poised to snap a winless streak dating back to June 2013. Circumstances, however, worked against him and instead of ending the night in Victory Lane, he finished ninth.

“Hard to be disappointed with how we ran, just disappointed in the outcome and the finish,” Truex said. “But again, the guys have really done a great job and this is something we can, moving forward, build on and hopefully we can be in some position to win some races this year.”

Truex’s race turned as he was charging to pass leader Kevin Harvick in the final laps. Running second and having conserved enough fuel to make it to the finish, crew chief Cole Pearn instructed Truex to “start going hard.”

The Furniture Row Racing driver did as told and was significantly cutting the gap between himself and Harvick when Ricky Stenhouse Jr. crashed to bring out a caution with 11 laps remaining. Faced with the decision on whether to pit, Pearn elected to go with fuel only. Harvick went with fuel and right-side tires, while eventual winner Jimmie Johnson, Dale Earnhardt Jr. and others didn’t stop.

The decision to pit and not take tires proved costly. Though he restarted sixth, Truex couldn’t get going and slid to ninth. Conversely, Harvick on fresher tires quickly moved from fifth to second and likely would have passed Johnson for the win had he not bobbled on the penultimate lap.

“We should have either stayed out or took new tires,” Truex said. “We probably did the worst thing you could have done there with just staying out and getting gas only, because we ended up being the last guy with no tires. Everybody else behind us had two and they ate us up on the restart. If we’d have taken two, we probably would have come out sixth, been in a pretty good position.”

Pearn is in his first year as a crew chief, having been elevated from engineer in the offseason. His promotion has contributed heavily to Truex enjoying a terrific start to the season with top-10 finishes in all but one race and sitting a career-best second in the standings after 11 races.

Truex backed his crew chief post-race, saying Saturday offers a great learning experience.

“Hindsight is 20/20,” Truex said. “He’s done a great job this year of calling races. I just want to make sure that he doesn’t get his confidence down, because he’s been so good at it. Live and learn. He’ll learn from tonight and get better next time around, and he’s doing a great job.”