Event statistics
following the fifth race of the 2018 Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series season,
the Auto Club 400 at Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, California.
Martin Truex
Jr. scored a decisive victory, leading more than half the race and winning by
more than 10 seconds to earn his first win of the season, and breaking Kevin
Harvick’s three-race winning streak in the process. Defending race winner Kyle Larson
was second, followed by Kyle Busch. Harvick finished 35th out of 37 cars, nine
laps down.
Race Statistics
Auto Club 400
Auto Club Speedway –
Fontana, California
- Winner
(starting position): Martin Truex Jr. (1st)
- Top Five:
Martin Truex Jr., Kyle Larson, Kyle Busch, Brad Keselowski, Joey Logano
- Full
Results: Martin Truex Jr., Kyle Larson, Kyle Busch, Brad Keselowski, Joey
Logano, Denny Hamlin, Erik Jones, Ryan Blaney, Jimmie Johnson, Austin Dillon,
Clint Bowyer, Aric Almirola, Alex Bowman, Kurt Busch, William Byron, Chase
Elliott, Jamie McMurray, Ricky Stenhouse Jr., Paul Menard, Darrell Wallace Jr.,
Ryan Newman, A.J. Allmendinger, Daniel Suarez, Kasey Kahne, David Ragan,
Michael McDowell, Ty Dillon, Cole Whitt, Ross Chastain, Chris Buescher, Matt
DiBenedetto, Gray Gaulding, Timmy Hill, Reed Sorensen, Kevin Harvick, Jeffrey
Earnhardt, Trevor Bayne
- Average
Speed: 147.526 mph
- Laps
Completed: 200
- Race Leaders:
7
- Laps Led: Martin
Truex Jr. (125), Kyle Busch (62), Joey Logano (9), Denny Hamlin (1), William
Byron (1), Chase Elliott (1), Kasey Kahne (1)
- Pole Position: Martin Truex Jr. (186.567 mph; 38.592
seconds)
- Hard
Charger: Jimmie Johnson (+24; 33rd to 9th)
- Margin of
Victory: 11.685 seconds
- Car Count: 37
- Cars
Entered: 37
- Cars
Running at Finish: 36 (of 37; or 97 percent of the field)
- Drivers to
Finish on Lead Lap: 10
- Cautions: 5
for 21 laps
- Lead
Changes: 16
- Stage
Winners: Martin Truex Jr. (1), Martin Truex Jr. (2)
- Weather at
Start of Race: 64 degrees Fahrenheit, partly cloudy, winds W 4 mph
- Weather at
End of Race: 63 degrees Fahrenheit, partly cloudy, winds WSW 5 mph
-
Manufacturer Breakdown: Chevrolet (18); Ford (13); Toyota (6)
Notes of Interest – Race/Weekend
Recap
- This is
Martin Truex Jr.’s first Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series victory of the season
and the 16th of his career. It is his first victory at Auto Club Speedway,
besting his previous best finish at the track of fourth in 2017.
- Truex is
the 17th driver overall to win a Cup Series race at Auto Club Speedway.
- This is the
Truex’s first victory since last year’s season-finale at Homestead-Miami
Speedway in Florida.
- This is
Truex’s second victory on an oval of two miles or more; his other victory on a
track at two miles or more was the 2015 spring race at Pocono Raceway.
- This is
Truex’s third-career victory from the pole position. His previous victories
from the pole came in the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway in 2016 and
the 2017 fall race at Kansas Speedway.
- This is
Truex’s fourth consecutive top-five finish, after finishing 18th in the Daytona
500. He leads all drivers with an average finish of 6.6 this season (best among
drivers to compete in every race), and over the last four races, has an average
finish of 3.75.
- In the
process of winning, Truex also picked up the lead in the points standings.
- Truex won
by 11.685 seconds, the largest margin of victory by a driver this season.
- Truex led
125 laps of the Auto Club 400, the most laps he’s led in a victory since the
2017 race at Kentucky Speedway (152).
- Truex,
along with Denny Hamlin, is the only driver to lead laps in each of the last
three races at Auto Club Speedway.
- Truex is
the only driver to lead laps in each of the last six races. His 125 laps led at
Fontana was more than the previous five races combined; he had only led 14 laps
in the previous four races this season.
- Truex is
the only driver to sweep both stages and win the race; his victory Sunday was
the third time he’s done so since stage racing was introduced. Truex also on
Sunday became the first driver to accomplish that feat from the pole position.
- Truex is
the first driver to win a race from the pole position this season; the previous
best starting position of the race-winning driver was second (Kevin Harvick at
Las Vegas Motor Speedway). The previous best finish by a polesitter this season
was fifth (Truex at ISM Raceway and Ryan Blaney at Las Vegas).
- Truex was
the last driver to win a Cup Series race from the pole, doing so last season at
the fall race at Kansas Speedway.
- Truex now
has 29 career NASCAR national victories – 16 in the Cup Series and 13 in the
Xfinity Series.
- Truex has
now won at least one Cup Series race in each of the last four seasons, and 14
of his 16 career victories have come in the last four seasons (eight came in
2017). He only had two victories in his first nine full seasons.
- This is
Truex’s 14th victory with Furniture Row Racing.
- Truex’s
pole was the 17th of his career and second of the season; he won the pole at
ISM Raceway last weekend. It marked Truex’s first pole at Auto Club Speedway,
and the 12th track at which he’s earned a pole position.
- This is the
second consecutive year and third all-time the Cup Series race winner won from
the pole. Kyle Larson did so in 2017, while Jimmie Johnson won the fall race at
Auto Club Speedway in 2008.
- This marked
Toyota’s first victory of the season. Truex was the last driver to win a Cup Series
race in a Toyota, when he did so last season at Homestead-Miami Speedway.
- Kyle Busch
was the last driver to win a race at Auto Club Speedway in a Toyota, in 2014.
- Truex
averaged 147.526 mph, the fastest in a race at Auto Club Speedway that went the
full distance since the 2011 race, won by Kevin Harvick.
- Truex led
the most laps in the race. The driver leading the most laps in a race has gone
on to win now 15 times in 29 races.
- Defending
race winner Kyle Larson finished second, his best finish of 2018 and second
top-three finish of the season. Larson has top threes in three of the last six
races. Larson drove the highest-finishing Chevrolet.
- Kyle Busch
finished third, his third consecutive top-three finish after a pair of second-place
runs the last two races. This is Busch’s best finish at Auto Club Speedway since
he won the 2014 race. Busch joins Truex as the only two drivers to finish in
the top five in each of the last three races.
- Kyle Busch
led 62 laps, the second most of any driver, and has now led each of the last
four races, second only to Truex. Busch is also second to Kevin Harvick in laps
led this season, with 209 (Harvick has 433).
- Brad
Keselowski was fourth in the top-finishing Ford. Keselowski has finished sixth
or better in three races this season.
- Keselowski’s
Team Penske teammate, Joey Logano, finished fifth, having led one lap. Logano and
teammate Ryan Blaney have finished all but one lap of 1,311 laps contested this
season.
- Denny
Hamlin finished sixth, his fourth finish this season of sixth or better. It
marked Hamlin’s only sixth top-10 finish in 17 races at Fontana; he has yet to
win at the two-mile track.
- Erik Jones
finished seventh, his best finish of 2018 and third consecutive top 10. Jones
is one of three drivers (Truex, Keselowski and Kyle Busch the others) to finish
every lap of the last four races, after completing only 59 laps in the Daytona
500.
- Ryan Blaney
finished eighth, his third top-10 finish of 2018.
- Jimmie
Johnson broke a 10-race streak of finishing outside the top 10, when he earned
the ninth-place finish. Johnson, the all-time leader in race victories at Auto
Club Speedway with six, completed all 200 laps, for only the second time in
five races this year. However, he’s completed every lap of a race he’s run at
Auto Club Speedway – 5,506 laps out of 5,506. Johnson also advanced a race-high
24 positions.
- Austin
Dillon earned his best finish since winning the Daytona 500, with a 10th-place
effort. Dillon was the last driver to finish on the lead lap.
- Despite a
12th-place finish at Fontana, Aric Almirola is tied with the seventh-best
average finish of all drivers, 10.6 (Clint Bowyer, who finished 11th, also has
an average finish of 10.6).
- Drivers who
earned or tied their best finish of the season were: Alex Bowman (13th) and
Timmy Hill (33rd). Reed Sorensen finished 34th in his season debut.
- Kasey Kahne
finished 24th. He led one lap, his first lap led while driving for Leavine
Family Racing.
- Cole Whitt
finished 28th; he’s finished 28th in all three of his starts this season.
- Gray
Gaulding, who finished 32nd, has completed the fewest number of laps by a
driver to complete in all five races this season (987 laps; has yet to complete
every lap in a race in 2018).
- After a
three-race winning streak, Kevin Harvick finished 35th.
- Trevor
Bayne finished 37th, the fifth time in 171 career races he’s finished last and
first time since the 2016 race at Darlington Raceway. It marks the first time a
Jack Roush-owned car has finished last since the 2017 race at Sonoma Raceway
with Ricky Stenhouse Jr., who finished 38th. Bayne was the only driver to
retire from the race, after his Ford was involved in an accident.
- A total of 16
drivers improved on their starting position in the race.
- This is the
fourth race out of five this season in which one driver has led at least half
of the race’s laps.
- The 37-car
field was the smallest-ever for a Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series race at Auto
Club Speedway; the smallest previous field was 39 in 2016 and 2017.
- Thirty-six
cars finished the race, the most drivers to finish a race this season.
- This was
the first time since 2013 that the race at Auto Club Speedway did not go into
overtime.
- The next
race will be Sunday, March 25, with the STP 500 at Martinsville Speedway in
Martinsville, Virginia.
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