After a few seasons of re-signing one-year deals at Joe Gibbs Racing, it appears that 2024 will be Martin Truex Jr.’s final season in the NASCAR Cup Series.
In 673 career Cup starts, Truex has scored 34 Cup wins and the 2017 Cup championship. He is currently the oldest full-time Cup driver (will turn 44 on June 29), and he has the second-most starts of full-time drivers, trailing only Kyle Busch. In addition to his success in the Cup Series, Truex also recorded back-to-back Xfinity Series championships in 2004 and 2005 on his way up the ladder.
When Truex hangs up the helmet, he will unquestionably retire as a first ballot Hall of Famer. His 34 Cup wins are tied for the 25th-most all time, and he is still at the top of his game, as he currently sits fifth in Cup points and scored three wins just one season ago.
Truex and the No. 19 team have shown a ton of speed in 2024 with 447 laps led in the first 16 races, but they’ve had comically back luck to keep them out of victory lane. At Richmond Raceway in March, Truex was going to cruise to a dominant win until a spin with two laps to go set up an overtime restart. At Kansas Speedway in May, Truex was mowing through the field and had just approached leader Denny Hamlin, who had to save fuel, with under 10 laps to go. But once again, a late caution reset the field, and Truex was only able to manage fourth.
Then last Sunday (June 9) at Sonoma Raceway, Truex was poised for a second-place finish at minimum until his car ran out of fuel in the final turn and coasted to the checkered flag in a 3-minute and 19-second, 36 mph lap.
With the amount of speed Truex has shown, it would be a shock if his dominant win at New Hampshire Motor Speedway last July proved to be the final triumph of his career. He’s been great at New Hampshire, Nashville Superspeedway, Pocono Raceway, Martinsville Speedway, Richmond and Darlington Raceway, among other tracks, so there are plenty of opportunities for Truex to break into the win column in his last hurrah. And with how good Truex and JGR were at Phoenix Raceway in March, he has the potential to retire on top with a second title this November.
All in all, I predict that Truex will win two races at minimum in final 20 races of 2024. He will either make it to the Round of 8 or the Championship 4, and he will call it a career in one of the more successful farewell seasons in recent memory.
2. Can Shane van Gisbergen win out the remaining road courses of the Xfinity schedule?
After shocking the racing world in Chicago last July, Shane van Gisbergen has more than delivered on road courses in the first full-time Xfinity season.
He dominated at Circuit of the Americas and had that race in the bag until a late caution set up a chaotic overtime finish. He came back from early miscues at Portland International Raceway to score his first Xfinity win in convincing fashion after besting the dominant car of Justin Allgaier on the final restart.
He then made it back-to-back with a dominant win at Sonoma, scoring the pole, leading 32 laps and overcoming voltage issues and a pit road miscue to win after moving Austin Hill out of the way in turn 3 on the final restart. Even more impressive for van Gisbergen is that he wasn’t passed by a single car in the entire race.
Keep in mind, SVG has also been doing this in what has overall been a down year for Kaulig Racing. He also has the winningest road course racer in Xfinity history (AJ Allmendinger) as a teammate, and he’s blown him out of the water so far.
With just over half the Xfinity season left, there are three road courses left on the schedule: the Chicago street course on July 6, Watkins Glen International on Sept. 14 and the Charlotte Motor Speedway ROVAL on Oct. 12.
Barring any mechanical issues or a crash, my vote is on SVG winning the remaining road races on the schedule. He was the fastest car by far at COTA, Portland and Sonoma — three completely different tracks with different styles. If he’s that head and shoulders above the competition now, it will be tough for anyone else to find something for later in the season.
The biggest challenge SVG will face in winning the remaining races will arguably be Allmendinger at Charlotte, who has had a monopoly on the ROVAL with a Cup win last season and a perfect 4-for-4 record in winning his Xfinity starts. That race will be a matter of the unstoppable force meeting the immovable object, but SVG still has the advantage with how well he’s performed on them to open his Xfinity career.
3. Is Chase Elliott back to championship form?
After a winless 2023 season, a career low in laps led and a seven-race absence, it’s easy to forget that Chase Elliott was the man in 2022, with a series-leading five wins, a regular season championship and a Championship 4 appearance.
But everything resets at Daytona, and Elliott has made the most of the new leaf, as he broke his winless drought at Texas Motor Speedway and currently sits second in regular season points, 14 behind Hendrick Motorsports teammate Kyle Larson. He may not have the wins or even the speed that teammates Larson and William Byron have shown, but he’s right there with them and making his name known as the season progresses.
If there’s one thing that Elliott has been better at than everyone else, it’s keeping his car clean and avoiding trouble. He is the only driver this season to score a top-20 finish in every race, and he currently leads the series in average finish at 9.5. Furthermore, he has the best career average finish (12.9) of all full-time drivers in the series.
This season has been a huge turnaround for Elliott and the No. 9 team, but they’ll have to take a step up in the speed department until they’re officially back to where they were at the start of the 2020’s decade. Elliott’s getting the finishes, but he has only led a total of 10 laps since his win at Texas in April. This weekend at Sonoma was also the first time in the seven races since his Texas win that Elliott had an average running position better than 10th.
Nevertheless, the team has the consistency, and it’s showing the flashes of speed that it did not have last year. It’s only a matter of time before Elliott puts himself in the championship favorite conversation and starts rattling off more wins.
4. Who has the best pedigree at Iowa, and will that have any bearing on Sunday’s race?
If you want to know the drivers with the best results at Iowa Speedway ahead of its first-ever Cup race, look no further than Ryan Blaney, Erik Jones, Christopher Bell, Ricky Stenhouse Jr., Byron and Brad Keselowski, all of whom had recorded multiple wins at Iowa between Xfinity and Trucks on their way up the ladder.
But while they have the most wins and some of the most experience at Iowa, it will probably be all for naught, as Iowa underwent a bizarre repave that saw the bottom lanes in the turns — but not the entire track — repaved (NASCAR and Iowa later explained that there was not enough time to pave the full track before the cold weather last fall and to still have enough time to run a mandatory tire test once the winter was over). Fundamentally, this current Iowa will drive nothing like the Iowa of yesterday.
Larson, Bell and Keselowski all performed a tire test at the newly repaved Iowa in May, and while there is still some character left at the track, most of them voiced concerns about Iowa turning into a one-groove track since the old pavement up top will be useless when compared to the grip that new pavement on the inside line will offer.
Whether the remaining track will be repaved for 2025 is unknown, but what is known is that you can throw all the past results into the bin. Track position and strategy will be paramount, but it will also take a fast car to take advantage. And with Larson, Bell and Keselowski having the laps and time to practice at the track two weeks ago, it wouldn’t be a surprise to see them ahead of curve when the cars hit the track this weekend.
Stephen Stumpf is the NASCAR Content Director for Frontstretch and is a three-year veteran of the site. His weekly columns include “Stat Sheet” and “4 Burning Questions.” He also writes commentary, contributes to podcasts, edits articles and is frequently at the track for on-site coverage.
Can find on Twitter @stephen_stumpf.
Great… a one groove race. That should be nap inducing although there could be a lot of one car spins as a result of a new surface and too much speed. It’s easy to cross that line.
i cannot believe they did repave the entire track. this is going to be a cluster of a race on sunday. they should had waiting to repave until they could do it correctly!!!!
Agree.
Look at it like a glorified PJ1.
SSDD
Well he can finish his racing career with a second championship and go out on top.