BRISTOL, Tenn -- It seemed odd to have Martin Truex Jr. as the one driver to attend a recent news conference promoting the NASCAR Sprint Cup All-Star Race at Charlotte Motor Speedway.

That's because Truex didn't get to participate in the All-Star Race last year, and he isn't qualified yet for participation in this year's event as the Sprint Cup Series prepares for Sunday's Food City 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway. Drivers qualify for the All-Star event by winning races -- either within the year leading up to the current race or by having won a previous All-Star race, or by being a former champion.

A former two-time champion in the Nationwide Series, Truex has only one career Cup win -- and that came in 2007. But he insisted that his next win is not far away, largely because the pit crew on his new No. 56 Toyota team for Michael Waltrip Racing has proven to be outstanding through the first four races of this season.

"Our pit crew has been really good," Truex said. "They brought in some new guys. I'm not sure what they did to make them so good, but they're just incredible. They're super fast every week and don't make mistakes so far."

Truex contends that he could easily be sitting inside the "top 10 or 15" in the points standings. Despite the fact that he's only 24th heading into Sunday's race, both he and crew chief Pat Tryson said they're pleased not only with the pit crew's performance but also with the power the car has displayed.

"The pit crew has been awesome," Tryson said. "We're two bad finishes away from where we want to be, but that was all out of our control. We had two fast cars both of those days.

"We need to get better. We still have work to do. The Hendrick [Motorsports] cars are still the best, and we've got some work to do to catch them. We're just going to keep working and hopefully slowly pick ourselves up to where we need to be." (Continued)