Mark Martin Race Summary: No.55 Aaron’s Dream Machine Toyota driver Mark Martin finished second – by less than a second – to winner Joey Logano in Sunday’s 400-mile NASCAR Sprint Cup at Pocono Raceway. Martin started sixth and spent most of the race running in the top five. He used a daring pass on a restart to take the lead from Logano with eight laps remaining and held the lead the next four laps. Logano returned the favor with just four laps to go, making the pass and winning the race with Martin .997 seconds behind. Sunday’s finish was Martin’s 20th top-five finish at Pocono, the most of any driver. Martin and the Aaron’s Dream Machine Toyota return to action Sunday at Michigan International Speedway.
- Started sixth and finished second
- Raced in the top five throughout race.
- Took lead with eight laps remaining and held it for four laps.
- Logano passed Martin for the victory with four laps remaining.
- Martin’s 20 top-five finishes at Pocono is the most of any driver.
MARTIN QUOTE: “We were racing hard man. I wanted to win it so bad. I just want to thank Ken Butler (Aaron’s), everybody from Aaron’s, Toyota, the fans — because that’s why Ken Butler and Aaron’s gave me this chance — (and) Michael Waltrip. These guys are awesome. What a great race team. I’m so thankful that I have a chance to bid for a win. I wanted it really bad. Believe it or not, I fought for it tooth and nail. We had an awesome day today. MWR gave me a great car, Toyota gave me great engines. We were really close. Maybe next week we’ll be the ones with the trophy!
“They’ve (Toyota and TRD) been very, very helpful with us at MWR (Michael Waltrip Racing) for sure. This is my first experience with them and there are a lot of racers that help us with the engines and the technology. And, I really enjoy them and they’ve embraced me and that’s been nice. They have really made me feel welcome. I think that we had good power today and enough durability to make it to the end here, so that’s a fine edge there. We did have some problems at Kansas and they worked really hard to get those fixed up and to continue to be able to — this is a really, really competitive series and it’s amazing what they’ve been able to do and I appreciate their help so much.”
