NASCAR: Martin Truex Jr. complains about Joey Logano’s final restart

Martin Truex Jr. was not pleased with the restart that led to Joey Logano earning his second victory of the 2019 NASCAR Cup Series season.

Joey Logano winning a race and Martin Truex Jr. having something to say about it afterward has become an ongoing theme in the NASCAR Cup Series ever since Logano won the “battle” at Martinsville Speedway in late October last year before going on to win the “war” at Homestead-Miami Speedway a few weeks later.

The Team Penske driver earned his second victory of the 36-race 2019 season in the season’s 15th race, the FireKeepers Casino 400, at Michigan International Speedway following an overtime restart with two laps to go, a restart that the Joe Gibbs Racing driver claimed Logano jumped.

Here is what Truex Jr. had to say about the matter, according to NBC Sports.

"“I don’t know how you get away with that. I thought we were supposed to go in the box. I guess they don’t enforce those rules anymore. We’ll have to remember that for next time.”"

Here is what Logano had to say about it, according to NBC Sports.

"“I don’t know what I did. I did it when I got there (to the restart zone). That was a good start wasn’t it? That was a good one. That one felt good.”"

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NASCAR reviewed the restart and determined that Logano did not accelerate too soon.

Logano took the green flag on lap 202 of this 203-lap race around the four-turn, 2.0-mile (3.219-kilometer) Michigan International Speedway oval in Brooklyn, Michigan on the outside lane as the race leader in his #22 Ford with Truex Jr. to his inside in second place in his #19 Toyota.

The outside lane had been the superior lane, to say the very least, all race long on restarts to the point where the drivers restarting in second and third place regularly ended up both sliding out of the top three, many times out of the top five.

Truex Jr. still managed to secure a third place finish after he was passed by Chip Ganassi Racing’s Kurt Busch, who made the most out of his suboptimal restarting position of third on the inside lane to jump up to second and only finish 0.147 seconds behind Logano.

Truex Jr. did admit that his second gear was a bit off during restarts throughout the race, and he also stated that he didn’t know if he would have had anything for Logano anyway given how dominant Logano was all race, but not without making another claim that Logano effectively cheated to win.

Here is what Truex Jr. had to say, according to NBC Sports.

"“I don’t know if we could have done anything with [Logano]. We were going to need one heck of a push from behind – a shove down the straightaway. I could get a little bit of a run but never enough to get next to him and surely not enough to get next to him and clear him getting in the corner.“His car was really good. They were really fast obviously qualifying first and then as good as they raced. Hats off to those guys. I thought we’d rack them up there, you know green-white-checkered. I thought ‘Hey, maybe we do have a shot at this thing’ and then he jumped the restart by over a car length.”"

Joey Logano dominated this race after starting from the pole position, as he led 163 laps and was extremely hard to pass when he had clean air out in front of him with the race lead. Additionally, he became the first polesitter to win a NASCAR Cup Series race since Truex Jr. won the race at Kentucky Speedway last July, ending an all-time record 31-race pole-to-win drought.