Key Takeaways: Texas

By RJ Kraft
Follow @kraftdaddy85

FORT WORTH, Texas -- Drivers tested their limits at the track known for having “No Limits” on Saturday night. The Duck Commander 500 at Texas Motor Speedway saw plenty of passing, some pit road foibles and a late surge to the lead.

Here’s a look at some of the lasting impressions from the seventh race of the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series season and the first under the lights.

Loose wheels sink ships

Carl Edwards took the pole for the Duck Commander 500 and led four times for 124 laps. Given Joe Gibbs Racing’s strong runs of late, it felt like it was shaping up to be his night. A loose right front tire saw Edwards drop to 19th, though, underscoring the importance of accuracy on pit road.

'My mistake was I should have pulled to pit road immediately,' Edwards said after the race. 'I was still kind of in denial. Maybe, I’m imagining something, just got something stuck on the (right front) tire. Then as I passed pit road I realized, oh, this is not good.'

Forget about the flare

Prior to the start of the Duck Commander 500, NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Managing Director Richard Buck warned competitors in the drivers’ meeting about flaring out the side skirts on cars. The practice, which had become widespread in 2014, has not been allowed since the start of the 2015 season.

Sure enough, a team was issued a penalty for it. Paul Menard was posted and brought to pit road on Lap 124 to repair the side skirt on his car that had been pulled on a Lap 111 pit stop. Under a green flag, the team had to fix it to NASCAR’s satisfaction before rejoining the race. Menard went on to finish 26th.

'Six-Time' denied four in a row

Jimmie Johnson’s dominance at Texas is well-known. The six-time series champion came into Saturday night’s race as the winner of the past three Texas races. That made him an overwhelming favorite, but the field had other plans, and an early race pit road incident when he ran into the No. 18 of Kyle Busch certainly didn’t help.

'We overcame a lot today,' Johnson said. 'On that first pit stop, everyone was checking up and I hammered the back of the 18. We had to fix damage on the nose, and it wasn’t pretty. There’s a big hole up front and that couldn’t have been helping us at all.'

Pit road problems

Several top drivers had their share of trouble on pit road at Texas. Polesitter Carl Edwards had a loose wheel and there was contact between Kyle Busch and Jimmie Johnson leaving pit road. In addition, a failure to tighten all the lugnuts on a late stop took Matt Kenseth out of the top 10. Kevin Harvick got nabbed for two penalties -- speeding and an uncontrolled tire -- on the same stop.

The lugnut issue for Kenseth was the latest in a series of mishaps in 2016 for the snake-bitten driver. Harvick dropped to 0-for-27 at Texas; one of four tracks where he has yet to win (Kentucky, Pocono and Sonoma are the others), in what was a tough night for him as well.

Getting a grip

Cooler temperatures on Saturday night made the track a little more narrow, as second-place finisher Dale Earnhardt Jr. explained.

'The cool temperature adds a little bit of grip in the track, and that brings the groove down and makes that bottom groove a little more competitive, and I think that’s why we didn't really see a wide track,' he said.

This was the first time the 2016 rules package was run at night this year.

All he does is win

Kyle Busch is on a roll -- a major one. The 2015 NASCAR Sprint Cup champion has swept the past two doubleheader weekends at Martinsville (Sprint Cup and Camping World Truck Series) and Texas (Sprint Cup and XFINITY Series).

'I think the magic is Kyle Busch, but that’s just me,' Busch joked in his post-race press conference with team ownerJoe Gibbs.

With seven wins in his past 28 Sprint Cup wins, Busch and crew chief Adam Stevens have something special.

“It's hard to get a chemistry like Adam and Kyle have,' Gibbs said. 'They developed it over in the XFINITY program and everything that happened there.'