Take 5: Truex shows strength, others stumble at Las Vegas

There was plenty of drama to go around in Sunday’s opening race for the 2019 Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. While Martin Truex Jr. sped to victory, others must to dig out of a hole with two races left in the Round of 16. Here are five takeaways from racing in the Sin City.

TRUEX ON TOP: After a 10-race drought dating back to Sonoma in June, Martin Truex Jr. got back to Victory Lane when the stakes were raised. Truex locked himself into the Round of 12, using the No. 19’s strength in the second half of the final fuel run to pass Kevin Harvick late in the race. The last time Truex won the Vegas playoff opener was 2017 – his championship season. We'll see if he can duplicate the end result this time around.

NOT ALL JOLLY FOR JGR: Aside from Truex's victory, it was a rough day for the other three Joe Gibbs Racing competitors, who all failed to crack the top 10. Kyle Busch’s run-in with lapped cars in the closing laps left significant damage to the No. 18 and a fallout to a 19th-place result, while the speed in Denny Hamlin’s No. 11 was only good for 15th. Erik Jones had the worst go of it, though, taking his car to the garage to fix a stuck gear, resulting in a 36th-place finish. While Busch and Hamlin can fall back on playoff bonus points as insurance, Jones is in a deeper hole sitting last in the standings, 26 points back. “I still think we can get in on points,” Jones said. “It’s not too big to climb out of."

TOP-10 HOGS: Team Penske and Hendrick Motorsports accounted for six of the top-10 finishing positions on Sunday – Brad Keselowski (third), Chase Elliott (fourth), Ryan Blaney (fifth), Alex Bowman (sixth), William Byron (seventh) and Joey Logano (ninth). Byron rallied from a spin on Lap 182, while Logano and the 22 team recovered from damage following an incident with Daniel Suarez after leading a race-high 105 laps. If the consistency continues for both organizations, it’ll make for an interesting battle for real estate deeper into playoff eliminations.

HARVICK CARRIES SHR: Kevin Harvick came up just short of capping off a strong late-race run at Vegas, leading 47 laps to finish second. But the same success can’t be said for his Stewart-Haas Racing playoff counterparts Clint Bowyer and Aric Almirola. After starting on pole, Bowyer’s flat tire in the final stage forced him to settle for a 25th-place finish. Almirola led laps at the start of the race, but faded back to 13th at the end. Both drivers find themselves on the outside of the cutline looking in heading to Richmond and the Charlotte Roval, so there’s massive work to be done.

CONSISTENCY IS KEY: Kicking off the postseason as the 16th and final seed, Ryan Newman’s 10th-place finish lands him 13th in points, six points behind Aric Almirola on the cutline, launching ahead of Kurt Busch, Clint Bowyer and Erik Jones in the standings. Newman and the No. 6 Roush Fenway Racing team got here with consistent finishes and that has no sign of slowing down as he looks to take advantage of the mistakes by others.