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TALLADEGA, Ala. — Martin Truex Jr.’s Sprint Cup Series championship hopes ended abruptly only 41 laps into Sunday’s Hellmann’s 500 at Talladega Superspeedway. His pole-winning No. 78 Bass Pro Shops Toyota suddenly lost power while running on the high banks, leaving the title hopeful to slowly create a smoke trail through the track garage, where his Furniture Row Racing team awaited to start analyzing the problem.
It was the team’s first engine failure in two years.
As the team surveyed the car, one crew member picked up Truex’s helmet and slowly walked it back to the team trailer, essentially spelling the end of his day and his 2016 title hopes.
“It’s definitely disappointing; what else can you say?” Truex said. “We had a team capable of competing for the championship. And unfortunately we aren’t going to be able to show that. I guess there’s still a chance of a miracle, but I don’t see it happening. We’ll just have to wait and see how it all plays out today.”
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Truex, who is in the midst of a career-best, four-win season — including two victories in the opening round of Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup — will instead now be watching others vie for the title many figured Truex might well hoist.
As his Denver-based team hurried around the Talladega garage area examining his car, he looked over his shoulder, obviously feeling badly for them as well.
“I’m sure they’re devastated,” Truex said. “They’ve worked so hard this year to put us in a position to challenge for a championship. You know, we felt like we could do it. But this sport is tough.
“We didn’t perform at Kansas and Charlotte the way we are capable of and had some issues that bit us and put us in the hole. We could have gone there and done better and gotten a win and we wouldn’t be talking about this right now.
“At the end of the day, we didn’t get the job done. But we’ve got a great team. We’ve got four more races to try and win and I know we could win all four of them.”
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For all the disappointment Truex felt and displayed, he still spoke to reporters, demonstrating great perspective and promising a solid end to the year. Just not the end he and his team had hoped.
“It’s part of life, it’s part of racing,” Truex said. “You take it one week at a time. Enjoy the good days and try to get past the bad ones, that’s what you do no matter where you’re at.
“Just, damn. It just hurts to go out like that. We could have raced all day and gotten in a big wreck and still not made it, so there’s no telling. But it sure would have been nice to have at least found out, played the whole game so to speak and see what happened instead of barely making it to the first pit stop. That stings. But all in all, we can’t hang our heads. We’ve got a lot to be proud of,” said Truex.
“This will make us stronger.”