Play-By-Play Goody's Fast Relief 500

Photo by Ed Turner

MARTINSVILLE, NC- RIS -   Martin Truex Jr. started on the pole and quickly moved ahead of second place starter Joey Logano to slip to the preferred line along the inside of the track.

The field quickly lined up primarily nose to tail with the occasional impatient driver attempting to move up one spot as they approached the entrance to a turn.

Caution 1 (laps 23-28) were run under caution as Ricky Stenhouse Jr. appeared to wheel hop entering turn three and wrecked his second car of the weekend for this same problem. The rear end of the car was too crushed to allow the #17 Fastenal Ford to continue in the race and Stenhouse was listed as the last place car. Truex Jr. led the first 24 laps of the race until Joey Logano held the lead for two laps after pit stops.  Truex Jr retook the lead and held the top spot laps 46 – 62.

David Ragan in the #23 Dr Pepper Toyota was the second car off the track as he pulled into the garage area after running 60 laps. 

Caution 2 flew from laps 62-66 due to fluid on the track from the #23. During the pit stops, Regan Smith in the #7 led laps 63-64 until Truex Jr. retook the lead and stayed at the point laps 65-73.

The field settled down into a green flag run stretch with #78 Martin Truex Jr. leading the field at 100 of 500 laps.  The #78 was the lead car laps 80-110.  On lap 110, Kyle Busch caught Truex Jr and the #18 Toyota led laps 111-113 before Truex Jr regained the lead. In third position was a second Gibbs Toyota, the #20 of Matt Kenseth. Truex led laps 114-150.

During the #78’s time at the front, caution #3 flew for laps 133-139.  The #44 of Brian Scott started a wheel hop and his # 44 Ford brushed the wall. Soon afterwards, caution flew for debris on the track.

Pit stops proliferated.  Kevin Harvick was charged with speeding on pit road and had to serve a penalty that put him at the rear of the field.  Truex Jr. still led the field after all pit stops were completed.

Once again, the Toyotas dominated the top three spots.   For just lap 151, Kenseth led one lap until he and Truex Jr re-swapped positions. On lap 160, the top three runners were #78 Truex Jr., #20 Kenseth and #18 Kyle Busch.  Joey Logano in the #22 Ford held fourth position while the aggressive AJ Allmendinger maintained fifth position at this juncture of the race. Truex Jr paced the field laps 152-180.

Lap 181 had a few changes at the front as Kenseth was in the lead and Truex Jr dropped to second. However, Kyle Busch was the next to quickly overtake Truex Jr. and grabbed the second spot and Truex Jr settled into third position in the field.

Matt Kenseth took over field domination from Truex Jr. on lap 181 through lap 250.  During this time, caution #4 was displayed for laps 201-207 to remove debris on the backstretch. Denny Hamlin and Jimmie Johnson started to rub and slightly beat on each other’s cars.  Parts were hanging off and NASCAR chose to throw the yellow flag for number caution #4 of the day.  Other reports said a banner came loose on the backstretch. Well, there was reportedly some type of debris.

The restart order after caution #4, on lap 208, was #20 Kenseth, #18 Kyle Busch, #78 Truex Jr., #22 Logano, #11 Hamlin and #47 Allmendinger. 

Green flag pit stops were underway on lap 357 when Carl Edwards damaged his #19 Toyota in turn two and caused the caution to be put into effect.   The cars in the lead at caution were #47 Allmendinger, #48 Johnson, #1 McMurray, #11 Hamlin, #18 Kyle Busch, #20 Kenseth, #78 Truex Jr, #88 Jeff Gordon, #2 Keselowski and #22Logano.  Edwards received extra damage to the #19 Toyota when he went across grass at the entrance of turn 3 and had to take his car to the garage.

Allmendinger ran out of fuel and was forced to pit when the pits were still closed.  Allmendinger lined up at the end of the line of cars when he returned to the track. Just before this, only 5 cars remained on the lead lap due to the caution coming out as green flag pit stops were underway.

A total of 29 laps (358-386) was spent under caution as NASCAR worked to straighten out the running order.

#11 Hamlin, #18 Busch, #47 Allmendinger, #88 Jeff Gordon, #1 McMurray, #48 Johnson, #20 Kenseth, #78 Truex Jr, # 2 Keselowski and # 22 Logano was the listed lineup with130 laps remaining (lap 370).

This running order was eventually revised to 11, 18, 48, 1, 20, 88, 78,2, 22 and #47 Allmendinger on the lead lap. # 5 Kahne, #42 Kyle Larson, #24 Chase Elliott, #16 Greg Biffle, #43 Aric Almirola and #31 Ryan Newman were one lap down. (This order was revised at least four times after being typed. The scoring kept changing.)

There were 21 wave around cars.  Allmendinger still had his penalty to start at the rear of the field for pitting while pits were closed.

During this time of confirming the running order, Carl Edwards had time to have repairs made to his car enabling him to return to the race while the cars were still under caution.

The green flag finally was displayed on lap 386. The 18 of Kyle Busch let 11 Hamlin take the lead on the restart. Jimmie Johnson took third and on lap 389 he moved inside the 18 and took second. Kyle Busch then became trapped in the outside line before pulling behind the 1 of McMurray.  McMurray was third and Busch fourth.

On lap 400 (100 to go), the running order was 11, 48, 1,20, 18, 78, 88, 2, 22, 47 on the lead lap.  The first car one lap down was Kasey Kahne.

On lap 403, Jimmie Johnson worked hard on Hamlin  but then Hamlin put a small amount of space between the two. Then on lap 407, Johnson worked to the inside of Hamlin’s car as they battled side by side until Johnson took the lead exiting turn four on lap 409.  Hamlin tried to return the favor but Johnson cleared the 11 Toyota of Hamlin. Lurking closely behind in third was Matt Kenseth. A few car lengths behind Kenseth were #18 Kyle Busch and Martin Truex Jr. in fifth position.   As the laps wound down, the running order settled into 48, 11, 20, 2,18,78, 88, 1, 22, 47 on the lead lap. Kasey Kahne remained the first car one lap down.

With thirty laps remaining, #2 Keselowski passed #20 Kenseth for third position. With 23 laps remaining, Keselowski worked hard to pass to the inside of Hamlin to take the second spot.

With 10 laps remaining, Keselowski cleared the last car between his #2 and the #48 of Johnson.  More lapped traffic affected first Johnson and then Keselowski.  Johnson maintained his distance from second place Keselowski and held on to win the 68th Annual Goody’s Fast Relief 500 at Martinsville Speedway making this his 79th career NASCAR Sprint Cup Series win and kept him in the running to win his 7th NASCAR Sprint Cup Championship.  The remaining top five finishers were Brad Keselowski, Denny Hamlin, Matt Kenseth and Kyle Busch.  Sixth through tenth finishers were Jeff Gordon, Martin Truex Jr, Jamie McMurray, Joey Logano and AJ Allmendinger.

Jimmie Johnson leads the point standings by 5 over Denny Hamlin.

The next race is November6, 2016 at Texas Motor Speedway.

Ed Turner

Staff Writer and editor for RIS since 2001. Been attending NASCAR and stock car races since my dad starting taking me in 1960 at the age of 5.

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Volume 2016, Issue 8, Posted 6:06 PM, 10.30.2016