Team Penske driver bounces back from Darlington struggles with strong run at short track.
Joey Logano rebounded at Martinsville Speedway from a dismal performance a week earlier at Darlington to claim third in the Cook Out 400, his second top-five finish in the season’s first seven races. “Solid rebound for everybody,” said Logano, who noted his Penske team was expected to perform well at the historic Martinsville track.
“Weekends like last weekend you start to question everything.” Logano finished 33rd at Darlington, three laps off the pace to winner Tyler Reddick. At Martinsville, the shortest track in NASCAR’s Cup Series, Logano finished 2.073 seconds behind winner Chase Elliott. Logano’s third place Martinsville finish was his best and only other top 10 since he took third in the season opening Daytona 500. “Honestly, if we were able to get to the lead, I don’t know if the 9 was any better than us,” Logano said. “He just got the clean air at the right time. If we were able to do that, we could have been in that position as well.”Logano led Team Penske’s short-track charge that saw Ryan Blaney finish sixth and Austin Cindric place eighth. Josh Berry, whose Wood Brothers Ford has a technical alliance with Penske, took 10th for his second top 10 this year. “I feel like we definitely got our heads a little bit more wrapped around these type of race tracks,” Logano said. “You have to come out here and run top five when you have those tracks on the schedule. Got to keep working on the other ones.” After seven races, Blaney is second in the standings, 82 points behind Tyler Reddick. Logano is 12th, Cindric is 18th, and Berry is 25th. Blaney, who is the only Team Penske driver this year with a victory, assessed his day overall as “a really good day.” “I thought we got a little better all day,” said Blaney, who led two laps in the Cook Out 400. “By the last run or so, I thought I was a top three car for sure. What happened on the restart kind of put us back.” Blaney and Denny Hamlin got together and Blaney brushed the wall on the restart following the fifth and final caution period. “Probably one of the better spring races we’ve had in a couple years,” Blaney said. “Really good day on pit road.”Fifth-straight top 10 for Gibbs Twenty-three-year-old Ty Gibbs walked off with his first top five at Martinsville Speedway and his fifth consecutive top-10 finish in Sunday’s Cook Out 400. “I need to do a little bit better of a job. Maybe next time I come back, I’ll be even better than this,” Gibbs said. “My pit crew killed it. I feel like we’re really strong. I keep capitalizing on it.” Another top 10 for Byron William Byron, who owns three Martinsville victories, put together a solid run in Sunday’s Cook Out 400 to finish fifth for his fourth consecutive top 10 this season. “We needed some track position,” Byron said. “We had one hiccup there on pit road. Just missing a little bit in the one part of the corner. Just trying to sort of get the entry a little bit better. Keep working on it and get better for the fall.”--END--
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