{"id":23607,"date":"2019-02-23T11:11:12","date_gmt":"2019-02-23T17:11:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/?p=23607"},"modified":"2019-02-23T11:16:57","modified_gmt":"2019-02-23T17:16:57","slug":"martin-truex-jr-with-new-rules-weve-seen-the-last-of-a-big-three","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/2019\/02\/23\/martin-truex-jr-with-new-rules-weve-seen-the-last-of-a-big-three\/","title":{"rendered":"Martin Truex Jr.: With new rules, we\u2019ve seen the last of a \u201cBig Three\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service<\/em><\/p>\n

HAMPTON, Ga. \u2013 As the 2019 Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series<\/a> gets into full swing, the concept of a \u201cBig Three\u201d might be dead on arrival.<\/p>\n

At least that\u2019s what Martin Truex Jr.<\/strong> thinks.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Martin Truex Jr., driver of the #19 Bass Pro Shops\/Trdacker ATVs Toyota, drives during practice for the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Advance Auto Parts Clash at Daytona International Speedway on February 9, 2019 in Daytona Beach, Florida. (Photo by Chris Graythen\/Getty Images)<\/p><\/div>\n

Last season, Kyle Busch and Kevin Harvick won eight races each, and Truex added four as the so-called Big Three grabbed the trophies in 20 of the 36 points races in NASCAR\u2019s premier series.<\/p>\n

All three drivers qualified for the Championship 4 race at Homestead-Miami Speedway, only to lose the title to late bloomer Joey Logano.<\/p>\n

With a new higher-downforce, lower-horsepower competition package in place for the 2019 season, however, Truex doubts that any three drivers will combine to win more than half the races.<\/p>\n

\u201cUnfortunately, yeah, I believe that\u2019s correct,\u201d Truex said with a wry smile during a media session on Friday at Atlanta Motor Speedway, host venue for Sunday\u2019s Folds of Honor QuikTrip 500 (2 p.m. ET on FOX, PRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio). <\/p>\n

\u201cAgain, it\u2019s all speculation. I don\u2019t know until we get going. You\u2019re still going to have teams figure it out better than others. Whether we\u2019re one of those, we\u2019ll have to wait and see.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

NASCAR driver Martin Truex Jr. speaks with the media during the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series 61st Annual Daytona 500 Media Day at Daytona International Speedway on February 13, 2019 in Daytona Beach, Florida. (Photo by Jared C. Tilton\/Getty Images)<\/p><\/div>\n

Not only are the new rules designed to keep the cars closer together, but Truex expects the package to accentuate the unique characteristics that distinguish one track from the next.<\/p>\n

Consequently, what works at one intermediate speedway\u2014Las Vegas, for example\u2014may not be an optimal solution at Texas or Chicagoland.<\/p>\n

\u201cOh, yeah, it\u2019ll be different everywhere,\u201d predicted Truex, who won eight races during his 2017 championship season. \u201cThe package is going to look a little different depending on the track we\u2019re at and what we\u2019re able to do with it. <\/p>\n

\u201cHere (at Atlanta) it\u2019s so worn out and so rough and bumpy, it\u2019s hard to\u2026 in order to get through the corners, you kind have to have some air on your car. Next week (at Las Vegas), we\u2019ll definitely be drafting\u2014at least that\u2019s what everyone is kind of thinking.\u201d<\/p>\n

The first test of the new package comes on Sunday, and to Truex, it\u2019s still a vast unknown.<\/p>\n

\u201cNobody has any idea about anything,\u201d he said. \u201cI think pretty much all teams had more questions going into practice (Friday) than any time I can remember in the sport, maybe back to when we first ran the Car of Tomorrow (in 2007).<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was just there were so many questions and so many different ways you can do this. There\u2019s so many different options to set the car up aero-wise and different things. A lot of questions and only an hour and 20 minutes of practice, so still a lot to learn.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe go to Phoenix (a one-mile flat track on March 10), and it\u2019s going to be totally different again with more horsepower, so, yeah, we\u2019re going to learn a lot through the first five races with the different race tracks and then try to figure it out and go from there.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service HAMPTON, Ga. \u2013 As the 2019 Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series gets into full swing, the concept of a \u201cBig Three\u201d might be dead on arrival. At least that\u2019s what Martin Truex Jr. thinks. Last season, Kyle Busch and Kevin Harvick won eight races each, and Truex added four […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":676,"featured_media":23397,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[11],"tags":[52,16],"class_list":["post-23607","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nascar","tag-atlanta-motor-speedway","tag-nascar"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/racedaysa.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/02\/360069.jpg?fit=3687%2C2458&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7hzTZ-68L","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23607","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/676"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23607"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23607\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23609,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23607\/revisions\/23609"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23397"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23607"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23607"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23607"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}