Truex, Jr. Wins Caution Filled Clash At L.A.Coliseum

In a race beset with spins and cautions, Martin Truex, Jr. came out on top of Sunday night’s Busch Light Clash at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum.

Truex took the lead from an ailing Ryan Preece with 25 laps to go, and went on to hold off challenges from Austin Dillon, Kyle Busch, and Bubba Wallace to score the preseason victory for the NASCAR Cup Series at the temporary quarter-mile circuit inside the historic Southern California stadium.

The win came after a winless 2022 for Truex, and it marks his first win in the non-points exhibition event.

“Last year was a pretty rough season for us with no wins, and to come out here and kick it off this way, really proud of all these guys,” Truex said. “Tonight was kind of persevere, not give up, just battle through and we found ourself in the right spot at the end.

“Sometimes they work out your way and sometimes they don’t. Tonight it went our way, and we made some good adjustments, too.”

After being one of the fastest cars in Saturday’s practice sessions, Truex did not have a good qualifying run, turning in the 22nd fastest time. But he rebounded earlier on Sunday afternoon by winning his heat race.

Truex ran among the top five all night, and was running third to leader Preece and second place Alex Bowman on a restart with 37 laps to go. He moved around Bowman two laps later. Ten laps after that, with Preece reporting an electrical issue on his Ford, Truex, bypassed him to take the point.

From there, Truex led the rest of the way en route to the victory.

“Yeah, it was definitely satisfying. Anytime you win it’s obviously satisfying,” Truex said. “I had some good guys around me. Austin and Kyle raced clean, and for the most part I’ve never had really any big issues with those guys. You come to a track like this, it’s pretty easy to just blow the corner and knock the guy out of the way in front of you. It’s just easy to do.

“Thankfully they didn’t do that. They gave me a lap to get going, and obviously we were fast enough to drive away from them.”

Dillon finished in second, but it didn’t come without some controversy.

Dillon was battling with second place Wallace, with the two swapping the position back and forth. With seven laps to go, Dillon drilled Wallace in the bumper going into turn 1, sending Wallace’s car spinning.

As the field came back around under caution, Wallace clipped Dillon’s car in retaliation.

“Qualifying went well, and we got to beating and banging out there pretty good but we ended coming home second,” said Dillon. “It was nice. Kyle (Busch), he knew we had a really fast car and he let me run down Truex at the end. That was nice of him. Loving my new teammate. We’ll go to Daytona and see if we can’t return the favor.”

Wallace would finish in 22nd position.

Kyle Busch, in his first stint for Richard Childress Racing, took second on the final restart, but moved out of the way for his teammate Dillon. In the end, it was a solid third place finish for Busch.

“Man, if I had another 15 laps of rear tires on it, I think we could’ve went spin to win,” Busch said. “All of these boys would’ve been sad seeing that happen. It was a good run for us. You can never count us out.”

The race was slowed 16 times by cautions, most due to spins. That’s compared to just five yellow flags that were thrown in the 2022 running of the event.

The heartbreak story of the night was Preece, the NASCAR Modified Series veteran who was making his first start for Stewart Haas Racing after sitting out a year from the NASCAR Cup Series.

The short track ace wrestled his way through the field, and used a strong pass on the outside of Wallace on lap 82 to take the lead.

He would hold the point through a number of cautions, keeping his opponents at bay as he led 43 of the 150 green flag laps on the night – the most of any competitor. He would stay in control of the event until 25 laps to go, when a fuel pump issue reared its ugly head.

Despite the problem, Preece held on to finish in seventh.

“The fuel pump. The primary pump went bad. I don’t know. I don’t think we were close on fuel,” Preece said. “At first, I thought it was ignition because usually when it’s fuel it just keeps cutting, so I shut off my alternator and all of my electrical stuff and it seemed to help a little bit. It did it again and I lost four spots, so I just flipped the switch and a miracle happened.”

Alex Bowman came home in fourth, with Kyle Larson in fifth.

Tyler Reddick, Preece, Ross Chastain, Denny Hamlin, and William Byron rounded out the top 10.

Dawsonville, Georgia’s Chase Elliott fought handling issues all night, as well and incurring damage in a couple of incidents with other drivers. In the end, Elliott finished 21st in the 27 car field.

NASCAR Cup Series
Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum – Los Angeles, CA
Busch Light Clash – February 5, 2023

1. (2) Martin Truex, Jr., Toyota, 150.
2. (10) Austin Dillon, Chevrolet, 150.
3. (6) Kyle Busch, Chevrolet, 150.
4. (5) Alex Bowman, Chevrolet, 150.
5. (14) Kyle Larson, Chevrolet, 150.
6. (11) Tyler Reddick, Toyota, 150.
7. (16) Ryan Preece, Ford, 150.
8. (12) Ross Chastain, Chevrolet, 150.
9. (3) Denny Hamlin, Toyota, 150.
10. (4) William Byron, Chevrolet, 150.
11. (9) Justin Haley, Chevrolet, 150.
12. (18) Kevin Harvick, Ford, 150.
13. (23) Christopher Bell, Toyota, 150.
14. (13) Noah Gragson #, Chevrolet, 150.
15. (7) Chase Briscoe, Ford, 150.
16. (17) Joey Logano, Ford, 150.
17. (15) Ryan Blaney, Ford, 150.
18. (1) Aric Almirola, Ford, 150.
19. (19) Daniel Suarez, Chevrolet, 150.
20. (26) A.J. Allmendinger, Chevrolet, 150.
21. (22) Chase Elliott, Chevrolet, 150.
22. (8) Bubba Wallace, Toyota, 150.
23. (25) Todd Gilliland, Ford, Fuel, 140.
24. (21) Michael McDowell, Ford, Fuel, 137.
25. (27) Austin Cindric, Ford, Engine, 106.
26. (24) Ty Gibbs #, Toyota, Suspension, 81.
27. (20) Erik Jones, Chevrolet, Suspension, 16.
DNQ: 21 Harrison Burton
DNQ: 47 Ricky Stenhouse, Jr.
DNQ: 6 Brad Keselowski
DNQ: 7 Corey LaJoie
DNQ: 77 Ty Dillon
DNQ: 51 Cody Ware
DNQ: 17 Chris Buescher
DNQ: 78 B.J. McLeod
DNQ: 15 J.J. Yeley.

Average Speed of Race Winner: 21.831 mph.

Time of Race: 1 Hrs, 43 Mins, 4 Secs. Margin of Victory: .786 Seconds.

Caution Flags: 16 for 0 laps.

Lead Changes: 4 among 5 drivers.

Lap Leaders: A. Almirola 1-16;D. Hamlin 17-42;B. Wallace 43-82;R. Preece 83-125;M. Truex Jr. 126-150.

Leaders Summary: (Driver, Times Lead, Laps Led) Ryan Preece 1 time for 43 laps; Bubba Wallace 1 time for 40 laps; Denny Hamlin 1 time for 26 laps; Martin Truex Jr. 1 time for 25 laps; Aric Almirola 1 time for 16 laps.