The entire NASCAR Cup Series playoff format is a body of work. Going out there and winning one or two races is just not enough. Each race, starting from the round of 16 to the Championship 4, are mini rounds in themselves. A driver has to be consistent in order to collect those priceless stage points and with that, the win, of course. On that note, the entire NASCAR community knows how beneficial it is for any Cup driver to win the regular season championship.

Martin Truex Jr. was in an extremely strong spot after having clenched that coveted perk. He moved on to Darlington with a whopping 15 points bonus, which is worth three race wins. Despite being at the top of the driver standings, he suffered two back-to-back setbacks in the opening race of the playoffs and at Kansas. However, he did enough to move on to the round of 12, even after making a 19th-place finish.

Joe Gibbs revealed the number 19 team’s mistakes

A lot has been said about how Martin Truex Jr. might miss his chance of winning the Championship title, despite being the points champion. A regular-season champion had never been eliminated from the opening round of the playoffs before. And if Truex had faced that nightmare, it would have been a first in the history of NASCAR.

Everyone on Sirius XM Radio was talking about this. During a post-race interview, team owner Joe Gibbs admitted, “You couldn’t turn on Sirius radio without people saying this could be the first. It just shows you what can happen in our sport, how hard it is.”

“We probably made some mistakes at Darlington, which is one of his best race tracks. Hit the wall there. Probably should have taken a different approach on it. James (Small) was certainly upset about all that,” he added.

Gibbs never expected to have their tires punctured like that. However, he expressed how relieved he was after Truex was able to maintain his position in the playoff rumble. “Just appreciate those guys, the way they fought tonight,” he said happily.

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Despite all the dirty air that had been revolving around Martin Truex Jr. and his chances of making it to the next round, a NASCAR veteran acquitted Truex of the blame against him at Kansas.

NASCAR insider predicted the mindset of Martin Truex Jr. prior to the race at Bristol Motor Speedway

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With a tire issue three laps into last weekend?s race at Kansas plus an 18th-place finish in the playoff opener at Darlington; Truex might have missed quite a few nights’ worth of sleep. Moreover, Bristol is not a forte for the 43-year-old speedster. In 32 previous starts at the half-mile concrete track, Truex has merely 4 top-10 finishes.

NASCAR Hall of Famer Dale Jarrett explained that the number 19 team should not have been in this situation with the number of points they started with. Although he admitted how Martin Truex is at deflecting the pressure most of the time, he hinted at the added pressure that shrouded his playoff journey.

Jarrett exclaimed, “You have the first two races like this and now you’re fighting for your playoff life! That puts your mindset somewhere that you shouldn’t even have to (be) thinking and when you start deviating from what you should be thinking then you find yourself in trouble again.”

NBC Sports analyst and writer Rick Allen opined that nobody expects these mistakes from a veteran Cup team like Joe Gibbs Racing. Jeff Burton, however, chose not to go so hard on the team and said, “I don’t know that I can put yesterday (Kansas) on them as a mistake…Goodyear said there was a puncture in the tire; that’s just bad luck.”

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