After starting on pole, Martin Truex Jr.'s day at Pocono goes sour
Pennsylvania 400 polewinner Martin Truex Jr. saw his hopes for another victory at Pocono Raceway dashed early on in Monday's rain-delayed NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race at Pocono Racway.
Shortly after a Lap 20 restart following a competition caution, Truex's No. 78 Furniture Row Racing Toyota appeared to be smoking on the right front and then abruptly crashed in the Tunnel Turn of the three-turn track.
It appeared that the valve stem on the inner liner on the right-front tire on Truex's car was knocked off, which caused the tire to go flat.
"Just blew a right front (tire)," Truex said. "A lug nut bounced off the ground, fell in behind the wheel behind a pit stop. It’s just bad luck honestly. I knew something wasn’t right in (Turn) 1 and 2. ... As I got closer to the Tunnel Turn I felt it start to go down and by the time I let off and tried to slow down it was just going straight for the fence.”
Truex brought his wounded Toyota down pit road for repairs, but his odds of winning were all but gone.
The crash occurred with Truex's favorite car, the one he won the Coca-Cola 600 with in May, when he lead a NASCAR-record 588 of 600 miles at Charlotte Motor Speedway.
Truex repaired his car and got back on the track, but suffered another flat tire on Lap 41, taking his day from bad to worse.
All that work... pic.twitter.com/COqOSq2t3v
— Furniture Row Racing (@FR78Racing) August 1, 2016
