<http://schema.org/text>
" \n\tNot long ago, Sonoma Raceway was owned by drivers Jeff Gordon and Tony Stewart who, between 1998-2006, won seven of the nine NASCAR Sprint Cup races at the 1.99-mile road course. Road-racing aces like Robby Gordon and Juan Pablo Montoya were the real competition, not the typical oval-centric stock car crowd. And certainly not drivers with a short-track background like Martin Truex Jr., in the midst of a 218-race winless skid.\n\n\tThe last seven trips have proved different, though. And Sunday was no exception, as Truex became the seventh straight driver to notch his first career road course win in Sonoma, winning the Toyota-Save Mart 350, and in the process, collecting his first Cup win since June 2007.\n\n\tRoad racing in NASCAR is all a matter of pit strategy \u2014 whether or not it all plays out as planned, or even makes any sense, is a different story \u2014 but Truex\u2019s No. 56 team played it like a fiddle (or in this case, a violin) in California\u2019s wine country.\n\n\tHaving abandoned the lead on lap 69 under a caution period, Truex found his Chad Johnston-led team hanging onto the top 15 when the race restarted. But when Kyle Busch and Carl Edwards tangled with 28 laps remaining, the leaders, including Jeff Gordon, Jimmie Johnson, Joey Logano, Kasey Kahne, Dale Earnhardt Jr., Clint Bowyer and Kurt Busch, pitted for fuel and tires. That handed the lead back to Truex when the field took the green flag with 24 laps to go.\n\n\tWhat was assumed would be a frantic final two dozen laps resulted in a tame affair, as Truex sprinted away from Matt Kenseth and Juan Pablo Montoya, and cruised to a 8.133-second win, his second career Cup victory.\n\n\t\u201CI was a frigging mess,\u201D Truex said of his emotional state on the cool-down lap. \u201CI had to stop and start doing donuts because I couldn't think about what I was doing. I tried to cue the radio once and I couldn't even talk.\n\n\t\u201CYou can't explain the feeling (of winning). When it's been that long and you worked so hard and you've been so close and so many things have just \u2014 when you think at times, \u2018Man, is this ever going to happen again,\u2019 it's just \u2026 you can't explain the feeling. It's pretty surreal. Unbelievable.\u201D\n\n\tTruex\u2019s main challenger, Montoya, ran out of fuel on the white flag lap, dropping from the runner-up spot to 34th. Meanwhile, Gordon tore through the field, gaining 16 spots over the last green flag run, and finished second. Carl Edwards, Kurt Busch and Bowyer rounded out the top 5.\n\n\t\u201CAfter Bowyer won (at Sonoma) last year it's obvious that Michael Waltrip Racing has a really good road racing program, and I've raced with Martin here before and he gets around here pretty good,\u201D Gordon said. \u201CThey had a good strategy and that can make or break you. And he does a nice job on the road courses. They had a good car.\u201D\n\n\tThe win vaulted Truex from 13th to 10th in the championship standings and, more importantly, gave him an insurance policy were he forced to rely on a \u201Cwild card\u201D to qualify for NASCAR\u2019s Chase for the Sprint Cup. Currently, Kahne (12th) and Tony Stewart (15th) are drivers outside of the top 10 that have a race win to their credit.\n\t\u00A0\n "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://athlonsports.com/nascar/martin-truex-jr-ends-nascar-skid-wins-sonoma?page=2>