Truex was doing well in the race, even passing Chris Buescher with less than ten laps to go. But then, Kyle Larson overtook both drivers with fresher tires, taking the lead.
Even though Truex wasn’t going to win, he was still set for a strong second-place finish. But right before the finish line, his car ran out of fuel. He went from second place to 27th, losing 25 positions. Luckily, he managed to cross the finish line, but his car was the last one on the lead lap.
Truex asked his crew chief why they didn’t save fuel while he was behind Larson, but the crew chief didn’t realize fuel would be a problem. This situation was similar to what happened to Ryan Blaney last weekend at Gateway.
Truex commented, “It was a tough day. Got spun out early and had to work hard to get some track position back. James [Small] did a good job on our strategy.
Our car was pretty good out front. Thought we were going to have a shot to win there and just couldn’t quite get by the 17 [Chris Buescher] quick enough. I finally cleared him; I made a mistake and the 5 [Kyle Larson] was right there to pounce and then obviously ran out of gas so it didn’t matter.
“I’m not sure why we didn’t try to save a little at the end. I was clearly not going to catch the 5 or pass him. It’s a shame that we went around the last corner and went from second to wherever we finished. It sucks, but it was a tough day, and we had a good car. We battled and did a good job. We were going to have a good day, but just one corner short.”
