In the moment, it was somewhat understandable why Martin Truex Jr. was left fuming after the checkered flag at Richmond.
By all accounts, Truex had Sunday night's race won with two laps to go before a caution created an overtime restart, creating an opportunity for Truex to lose the lead on pit road and watch another driver cross the finish line first despite him leading 228 of an eventual 407 laps. In his frustration, it was easy to take his anger out on Kyle Larson and Denny Hamlin, and also to lose sight of how his race as a whole helps him in the big picture.
Thanks to a fourth-place finish, a stage win, and a chunk of points overall, Truex has built his lead in the regular season Cup points standings to 14 points over Kyle Larson in second. And he has also now taken the top spot in the CBS Sports NASCAR Power Rankings, asserting himself as the Cup Series' seniormost driver on a weekend where Ty Gibbs faltered and fell to sixth in the Power Rankings.
Here's a look at CBS Sports' updated NASCAR Power Rankings following Richmond:
| Rank | Driver | Change | Comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Martin Truex Jr. | As Martin Truex Jr. alluded to in post-race, the way he ended up losing on Sunday smacked of another Richmond race in the fall of 2017, where he led 198 laps only to get wrecked in overtime. That race is remembered for the completely blank expressions Truex and crew chief Cole Pearn wore on their faces as they were presented that year's regular season championship trophy. | ||
| 2 | Denny Hamlin | With his 53rd career win, Denny Hamlin is now on the verge of matching and surpassing two legends on NASCAR's all-time wins list. His next win will tie him with Lee Petty (54), while two more wins will tie him with Rusty Wallace (55). | ||
| 3 | Christopher Bell | Christopher Bell fought back from a pit road speeding penalty at Richmond to finish sixth, allowing him to maintain his hot start to 2024. In seven races to start the year, Bell now has four finishes of sixth or better. | ||
| 4 | William Byron | Despite being a step behind Kyle Larson in terms of raw speed all night, William Byron nonetheless had a very good night in Richmond and finished seventh. Now it's off to Martinsville, where Byron has one win and has finished in the top 10 in half of his 12 starts there. | ||
| 5 | Kyle Larson | Speaking of that 2017 Richmond race I mentioned in Truex's blurb -- the beneficiary of that night's turn of events was Kyle Larson. Larson would end up winning the race, his fourth of that season in what was a career year up to that point. | ||
| 6 | Ty Gibbs | A 16th-place finish isn't horrible by any measure, but Ty Gibbs just didn't show any of the form or poise that he had shown to start the year in Richmond. That said, Gibbs still doesn't have a single finish worse than 17th this season. | ||
| 7 | Chris Buescher | Through seven races so far, Chris Buescher has earned five top 10 finishes. That's half the amount of top 10s he earned in all of 2022, which was then a career high for Buescher. His career continues to take off heading into Martinsville. | ||
| 8 | Joey Logano | Joey Logano came within a few laps of ending his year-long winless streak at Richmond before having to settle for second. He has one career win at Martinsville, but it sure counted: It was the thriller in the fall of 2018 that got him into the Championship 4 and set up his eventual championship triumph. | ||
| 9 | Ross Chastain | Ross Chastain has proven to have a high ceiling this season, as he now has only one finish worse than 15th in the first seven races of the year. That was the Daytona 500, where the stat sheet doesn't account for him spinning out trying to make the move for the lead at the white flag. | ||
| 10 | Tyler Reddick | -- | We referenced here last week that Tyler Reddick had never scored a single top 10 finish at Richmond. Well, no more! Reddick snuck into the top 10 in overtime and wound up 10th at the finish. | |
| 11 | Bubba Wallace | Bubba Wallace had run inside the top five all night at Richmond and was seemingly destined to finish there before another error on pit road cost him and his team dearly. The performance of the No. 23 pit crew has been a recurring issue, even as Wallace has matured as a driver and performed better over the last few years. | ||
| 12 | Chase Elliott | -- | So much for everyone saying to sound the alarm (si-reen?) on Chase Elliott. After qualifying on the outside pole, Elliott finished fifth at Richmond for his first such result of the year and his first since Daytona last August. | |
| 13 | Alex Bowman | The amount of F-bombs I heard on Alex Bowman's radio after Martin Truex Jr. pinned them a lap down at the end of Stage 2 had shades of the old "Gentleman's Agreement" that existed before the free pass, where there was an unwritten rule that the leader would back off coming to the caution and let lapped cars behind him pass him to get back on the lead lap. Not backing off and not letting someone get their lap back was a very quick way to make them angry. | ||
| 14 | Brad Keselowski | A 33rd place finish at COTA interrupted this, but the arrow has been pointing upwards on Brad Keselowski's performance overall. An eighth place finish at Richmond marked Keselowski's third top 10 in the last four races. | ||
| 15 | Ryan Blaney | Considering how well Joey Logano ran, it was very surprising that Ryan Blaney just seemed to have completely swung and missed on his car in Richmond. Blaney was never a factor and finished 19th. | ||
| 16 | Chase Briscoe | Keep Chase Briscoe on your short list of drivers to watch at Martinsville. He excels at this racetrack, where he's had two top fives and four top 10s in a row dating back to 2022. | ||
| 17 | Josh Berry | Josh Berry takes a big leap forward in this week's Power Rankings thanks to a Richmond performance that once again exhibited how skilled a short track racer he is. We should see more of that in Martinsville, where Berry has run so many laps in late models and earned a breakthrough Xfinity Series win in 2021. | ||
| 18 | Kyle Busch | -- | The caution for Kyle Busch more or less just getting up in the marbles in Turn 1 combined with controversy over whether or not the winner jumped the final restart reminded me so much of an Xfinity Series race that took place at Richmond in the fall of 2013. I hope Brian Scott wasn't watching on Sunday night because he probably would have known what he was looking at and wouldn't have liked it. | |
| 19 | Daniel Suarez | -- | If Josh Berry is going to run well at Martinsville, he may have to make sure he smooths things over with Daniel Suarez this week after Berry spun Suarez out at Richmond. One might say that Suarez owes Berry one after that. | |
| 20 | Noah Gragson | A nice bounceback performance for Noah Gragson at Richmond, where he briefly cracked the top 10 before finishing 12th. | ||
| 21 | Erik Jones | As it turned out, Richmond *was* a bit of a panacea for Erik Jones, as he wound up turning in a solid 14th place finish. Now it's off to Martinsville, where Jones has just one top 10 finish -- eighth in the spring of 021 -- in his Cup career. | ||
| 22 | Todd Gilliland | -- | Todd Gilliland was once again fast in intervals last weekend, qualifying sixth and driving all the way up to third in the early laps while on wet weather tires. Gilliland couldn't keep up his pace on slicks and eventually finished 21st. | |
| 23 | Michael McDowell | Michael McDowell's car exhibited speed in practice on Saturday morning, but it didn't carry over to qualifying nor to the race on Sunday night. McDowell started 31st and finished 26th. | ||
| 24 | John Hunter Nemechek | John Hunter Nemechek couldn't back up his excellent run at Bristol with another one at another short track in Richmond, finishing 25th. He'll get another crack at it at Martinsville, where he's won in both the Xfinity Series and Truck Series. | ||
| 25 | Ryan Preece | Ryan Preece looked as though he had a chance at a top 10 in the opening stage at Richmond, but he was ultimately never heard from again after a pit road penalty. Preece got stuck in nowhere land and finished 28th. | ||
| 26 | Carson Hocevar | Richmond was a brutal outing for Spire Motorsports as a whole, with Carson Hocevar serving as the team's -- relative -- lone bright spot on the night. By finishing 27th, Hocevar was the only Spire car who wasn't bringing up the rear. | ||
| 27 | Justin Haley | Justin Haley was actually one of the biggest movers through the field in the first 30 laps on wet weather tires, and he probably wishes the track had never dried out. Haley soon fell back to earth after he put slicks back on and finished out of sight and mind in 32nd. | ||
| 28 | Corey LaJoie | It's one thing to finish dead last when you've got a wrecked racecar or when the engine blows. But to finish last when every single car was running at the finish and no one had any major mechanical problems had to sting for Corey LaJoie. | ||
| 29 | Austin Cindric | Austin Cindric is back in the Power Rankings thanks to a weekend in Richmond that showed he's got speed under the hood, as he qualified ninth before missing out on a top 20 in 23rd. The last time the Cup Series raced at Martinsville last fall, Cindric earned a top 10 finish in ninth. | ||
| 30 | Austin Dillon | -- | Based on some of the scanner audio for Austin Dillon at Richmond, you have to wonder what's going on internally at Richard Childress Racing and how much of Dillon's frustration is set to boil over. He's firmly stuck in the mid-20s the past three weekends, compounding what's been an awful start to the season. |
