Practice report

NASCAR Cup Michigan

Truex tops second Michigan practice, Johnson spins

Martin Truex Jr. set the pace at the start — and the finish — of the second practice for the Firekeepers Casino 400 at Michigan International Speedway.

Edited: Jun 17, 2017, 3:36 PM

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Martin Truex Jr., Furniture Row Racing Toyota

Jimmie Johnson, Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet

Truex’s single-lap speed was 198.385mph topped the speed chart on Saturday morning. Kyle Busch was second quick followed by Jimmie Johnson, Ryan Blaney, Kevin Harvick, Brad Keselowski, Kyle Larson, Erik Jones, Joey Logano and Dale Earnhardt Jr.

“Here, like anywhere else this year, it seems like you need to just find a way to balance it – short run speed with the long run speed,” Truex said. “You kind of have to have long run speed to put yourself in position to win and then seems to always come down to short runs and cautions towards the end of the race and you need to be able to go on short runs, so just try to balance those two things out and get as much speed out of the car as we can and these guys do a great job of that, so looking forward to it and seeing what we can do.”

In the early moments of the 55-minute session, Truex Jr. posted the top speed of 196.920mph followed polesitter Kyle Larson (196.775mph), Denny Hamlin (196.587mph), Kyle Busch, Harvick, Jones, Johnson, Blaney, Earnhardt Jr., Logano and Kurt Busch,

Just after the 15-minute mark, Jones eclipsed his Furniture Row Racing teammate with a lap of 197.212mph. But the rookies time atop the speed chart was short-lived as Kyle Busch bumped him with a lap of 197.938mph.

Half-way into practice, Kyle Busch remained the fastest in single-run laps, Blaney moved up to P2 (197.320mph) with Jones, Earnhardt (196.942mph), Truex, Logano, Harvick, Larson and Clint Bowyer rounded out the top 10.

Johnson jumped up to second at the 32-minute mark with a lap of 197.341mph but on his next lap, he lost control of the No. 48 Chevy coming off of Turn 4 barely missing his Hendrick Motorsports teammate Kasey Kahne who was running right behind him. Johnson avoided the wall but came through the grass and damaged the splitter. The team elected to go to a backup car.

“I got loose into Turn 3 and fought it for a long time and unfortunately came around,” Johnson said. “Did a nice job of keeping it off the outside wall, but came back down the hill and into the grass and the front end dug in pretty good. I’m pretty surprised the guys feel like the damage isn’t too bad and they can get that stuff pulled back out and get the shape of the body back.

“So, we are out for the rest of this practice and we will get back on-track for the second one. Not the way we wanted to start the day, but it is what it is.”

NASCAR yellow-flagged practice but cars were back on the track 36 minutes to go and Kyle Busch leading the session in single-lap runs.

With 15-minutes remaining Truex vaulted to the top of the speed chart with a speed of 198.385mph. Kyle Busch was second followed by Johnson, Blaney and Keselowski. Five minutes later, Harvick moved up to fifth with a lap of 197.287mph.

Kyle Busch (196.876mph) had the fastest Best 10 consecutive lap averages. Larson was second (196.095mph) followed by Hamlin (195.901mph), Jones (195.714mph) and Harvick (195.684mph). Johnson, Earnhardt, McMurray, Kahne and Suarez rounded out the top 10 speeds in the category.

Four cars were penalized with 15-minute holds:

Jamie McMurray for being late to pre-qualifying inspection.

Ty Dillon, Ryan Newman and Matt DiBenedetto for failing pre-qualifying inspection multiple times.

Cla#DriverManufacturerLapsTimeGapIntervalMph 1 78 united_states Martin Truex Jr. Toyota 22 36.293 198.385 2 18 Kyle Busch Toyota 29 36.375 0.082 0.082 197.938 3 48 Jimmie Johnson Chevrolet 15 36.485 0.192 0.110 197.341 4 21 Ryan Blaney Ford 21 36.489 0.196 0.004 197.320 5 4 Kevin Harvick Ford 37 36.495 0.202 0.006 197.287 6 2 united_states Brad Keselowski Ford 17 36.495 0.202 0.000 197.287 7 42 Kyle Larson Chevrolet 24 36.503 0.210 0.008 197.244 8 77 Erik Jones Toyota 26 36.509 0.216 0.006 197.212 9 22 Joey Logano Ford 21 36.539 0.246 0.030 197.050 10 88 Dale Earnhardt Jr. Chevrolet 34 36.556 0.263 0.017 196.958 11 14 united_states Clint Bowyer Ford 21 36.595 0.302 0.039 196.748 12 5 Kasey Kahne Chevrolet 28 36.604 0.311 0.009 196.700 13 20 Matt Kenseth Toyota 25 36.624 0.331 0.020 196.592 14 11 Denny Hamlin Toyota 29 36.625 0.332 0.001 196.587 15 41 Kurt Busch Ford 26 36.687 0.394 0.062 196.255 16 19 mexico Daniel Suarez Toyota 31 36.710 0.417 0.023 196.132 17 17 united_states Ricky Stenhouse Jr. Ford 17 36.751 0.458 0.041 195.913 18 24 Chase Elliott Chevrolet 26 36.757 0.464 0.006 195.881 19 1 Jamie McMurray Chevrolet 20 36.765 0.472 0.008 195.838 20 6 Trevor Bayne Ford 15 36.789 0.496 0.024 195.711 21 3 Austin Dillon Chevrolet 17 36.869 0.576 0.080 195.286 22 47 united_states A.J. Allmendinger Chevrolet 18 36.911 0.618 0.042 195.064 23 37 Chris Buescher Chevrolet 18 36.952 0.659 0.041 194.847 24 31 Ryan Newman Chevrolet 14 37.001 0.708 0.049 194.589 25 10 Danica Patrick Ford 25 37.002 0.709 0.001 194.584 26 13 Ty Dillon Chevrolet 17 37.014 0.721 0.012 194.521 27 43 united_states Darrell Wallace Jr. Ford 27 37.047 0.754 0.033 194.348 28 95 Michael McDowell Chevrolet 22 37.071 0.778 0.024 194.222 29 38 David Ragan Ford 17 37.148 0.855 0.077 193.819 30 27 Paul Menard Chevrolet 24 37.173 0.880 0.025 193.689 31 32 Matt DiBenedetto Ford 19 37.459 1.166 0.286 192.210 32 23 united_states Ryan Sieg Toyota 14 37.789 1.496 0.330 190.532 33 15 Reed Sorenson Chevrolet 16 38.157 1.864 0.368 188.694 34 83 Corey Lajoie Toyota 16 38.234 1.941 0.077 188.314 35 72 Cole Whitt Chevrolet 13 38.329 2.036 0.095 187.847 36 33 Jeffrey Earnhardt Chevrolet 24 38.334 2.041 0.005 187.823 37 34 united_states Landon Cassill Ford 9 39.021 2.728 0.687 184.516

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