When Austin Dillon won his way into the playoffs with a victory in last summer’s regular season finale at Daytona, that left Truex – who had not yet won a race – out of the 16-driver playoff field.
Truex ended up going the entire 2022 season without a win – his first winless season since 2014 and finished 17th in the series standings.
One year later, Truex entered Saturday night’s regular season finale firmly locked in this year’s playoffs thanks to three wins and was in position to also wrap up the regular season championship, which he did during the race.
Truex, 43, finished an unremarkable 24th in the event but it is the big picture that’s most important – the No. 1 seed entering the playoffs and a solid chance to win his second series championship.
“Yeah, the trophy (for the regular season title) is really cool, but we are focused on the championship again this year, and that feels really good,” Truex said. “It’s really awesome to get these (15) bonus points.
“It was a little frustrating to not be able to really race after Denny (Hamlin) kind of got in that situation and we got the Stage 1 win – that was kind of a bummer, but big picture was the right thing to do.
“We’ve got to put together 10 great races like we did in 2017 again.”
There is plenty of evidence that is more than possible.
In addition to his three victories, Truex has led the second-most laps in the series this season (832), has the most top-10 finishes (15) and the best average finish (11.4).
Prior to Saturday night’s race at Daytona, Truex had six consecutive races in which he finished seventh or better and led 339 laps.
There has not been a track this season on which Truex’s No. 19 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota team didn’t appear to be able to compete for a win.
That difference over last season has not gone unnoticed by Truex.
“Thankful to turn it around from last year, missing the playoffs, is a big deal for all of us. I think the No. 19 team, not only that, but everybody at JGR, TRD, Toyota, we’ve won a lot more races this year, had a lot more speed across the board with all of our cars,” he said.
“It's fun to go to the track and know they’re going to give me something I can go out and win with almost every single weekend. We didn’t have that last year. It’s a lot of fun to race that way.
“We’ve got it right now. Hopefully, we can have it for 10 more weeks and go out on top here.”
