Martin Truex Jr., driver of the No. 19 Toyota Camry for Joe Gibbs Racing, captured his first career Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series short track checkered flag in the TOYOTA OWNERS 400 at Richmond Raceway (Richmond). The win at America’s Premier Short Track was his first Monster Energy Series victory and sixth top-10 finish of 2019.
“I’m really excited to win here at Richmond. I’ve always really enjoyed this track. I’ve always loved coming here,” said Truex, driver of the No. 19 Toyota Camry. “The short track win – everybody kept asking me when it was going to happen. TOYOTA OWNERS 400 – to win here in a Toyota was huge. Everybody at JGR (Joe Gibbs Racing) is doing a great job and with Toyota. Just a blessing to drive these race cars and have an awesome team. We’ve been chipping away at it and hopefully we can get better from here on out.”
The TOYOTA OWNERS 400 saw eight lead changes among five different leaders. Truex led a race high of 186 laps en route to his victory. It was his 20th career-series win and 18th victory in a Toyota Camry. It was also Truex’s first victory and tenth top-10 finish in 27 races at America’s Premier Short Track.
Truex led a race-high 186 laps (of 400) on the way to his 20th career-series win and 18th victory in a Toyota Camry. The top-five was rounded out by Joey Logano, Clint Bowyer, Kevin Harvick, and Chesterfield, Va. native Denny Hamlin, who tonight made his 400th Monster Energy Series start in a Toyota.
“We really closed on the leaders there at the end. We were fast, really fast the last 20 laps. We just didn’t have enough time,” said Hamlin, driver of the No. 11 FedEx Toyota Camry. “Certainly, a great day for our FedEx Camry. We wanted to win but we just didn’t have the winning car. We would have liked to have tuned it during happy hour, we just didn’t have enough time.”
It was a successful night for Toyota and Joe Gibbs Racing as they earned three spots in the top ten with Truex (first), Hamlin (fifth), and 2018 TOYOTA OWNERS 400 defending champion Kyle Busch (eighth) at Richmond. Busch leads the 2019 Monster Energy Series point standing by 20 points over Logano.
This is the third consecutive win for Toyota Racing at Richmond, including the sweep of the 2018 season completed by Busch. The win by Truex marks the sixth win this season by Toyota Racing with three different drivers.
Richmond Raceway PR
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