A missing lug nut cost Carl Edwards a chance at victory in the Lone Star State.
After starting on the pole, the driver of the No. 19 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota led a good chunk of the front-half of the Duck Commander 500. After leading 124 laps and coming off a fast stop, he was in position for a duel to the finish with Martin Truex Jr.
But prior to the restart, he felt a vibration and opted to ignore it. After the race restarted on lap 222, he started to slow down and made an unscheduled stop because of a loose wheel.
“I felt a problem right away,” Edwards said. “My mistake was I should have pulled to pit immediately. I was still in denial, (thinking) ‘Maybe I’m imagining something…maybe something got stuck on the tire.’ Then I realized, ‘This was not good.”‘
He rejoined the race in 19th one lap down.
Thanks to the misfortunes of others, he was able to salvage his race and bring his car home to a seventh-place finish. But that was little, if any, consolation to him as teammate Kyle Busch stole the race from Truex in the closing laps and scored the victory. He jokingly said he was “about done being happy for Kyle.”
“Nah. It’s awesome for JGR,” he said. “Our car is fast. That’s what it’s about. We run like that long enough and we’ll be fine. It was fun.
“It’s just racing. Look, I’m as disappointed as anybody but there’s nothing we can do about what happened. If we race like that regularly, we’re going to be great.”
For the most part, Texas Motor Speedway has been kind to Edwards over the years. In 23 career starts at the 1.5-mile circuit, he’s finished in the top-10 in over half his starts and in the top-five in just over a quarter of his starts. His 124 laps led were the first laps he’s led at Texas since 2013.
Despite the respectable numbers he’s put up, he’s yet to win at Texas in eight years.
“It’s been a good track for me,” Edwards added. “We’re doing great. We had the fastest qualifier, led the second-most laps. We were going for it tonight. It just didn’t work out.”
Edwards leaves Texas sitting fourth in the points 18 back of teammate Busch.
The next stop on the schedule is Bristol Motor Speedway, a track which he’s had some great runs at in the last two years.
