Brent Crews led all but one lap in a dominating ARCA Menards Series East race, as NASCAR made its return to Rockingham Speedway.
NASCAR
Taylor Gray was on the front row on the final restart before finishing fifth to lead Toyota in the NASCAR Xfinity Series race at Rockingham Speedway – won by Sammy Smith. For Gray, he closed to within 20 points of a Playoff berth.
“I feel like we had a really good Operation 300 Toyota GR Supra,” said Gray. “I’m really proud of all of these Joe Gibbs Racing guys. It was a good rebound after all of these five or six races we’ve had. We’ve had speed everywhere we’ve gone – just crappy luck. Proud of everyone and good to get back on track.”
- Taylor Gray
It was another great weekend for Sam Hunt Racing as Dean Thompson won the first-ever stage for the team and himself before finishing 11th. The California-native now has five top-15 finishes in the last six races.
On Friday evening, Corey Heim led a race-high 52 laps before pit strategy didn’t go his way, and the Toyota Development Driver was forced to make a pit stop late leading to an eighth-place finish. It was Heim’s fifth consecutive top-10 run, and sixth top-10 in seven races this season. Tyler Ankrum was the race winner.
“I thought we were really good all day,” said Heim. “I had a really good Tundra TRD Pro. Huge thank you to Safelite, Toyota, TRICON for all of their efforts. I felt like if we had the track position we would have been in really good shape from the very start. Just didn’t have a good qualifying effort on my end. It was kind of an uphill battle from there all day. I didn’t exactly know what happened there the last 40 laps, but we pitted, and it seems like some of the other guys didn’t run out of fuel. Unfortunate. Just a weird deal in that last stage but have to be better on my part to qualifying better and have the track position. Again, big thank you to TRICON Garage, Safelite and Toyota for all of their efforts.”
- Corey Heim
Rookie Gio Ruggiero (10th) delivered back-to-back top-10 finishes for the first time in his young career, and closed to within four points of a Playoff berth.
ARCA
Brent Crews earned his first ARCA Menards Series East victory in dominating fashion – leading all but one lap after starting from the pole. The 17-year-old Toyota Development Driver led a Joe Gibbs Racing 1-2 finish as William Sawalich brought his Camry home in second, while Patrick Staropoli finished fourth.
WHAT’S NEXT
NASCAR and ARCA return to the high banks of Talladega Superspeedway this weekend. On Saturday, April 26, there is a double header with the ARCA Menards Series competing at 12:30 p.m. ET on FS1, and the NASCAR Xfinity Series at 4:00 p.m. ET on the CW Network.
The NHRA Mission Foods Drag Racing Series have the second four-wide race of the year at North Carolina’s zMax Dragway. Final eliminations are on Sunday, April 27 at 7:00 p.m. ET on FS1.
The Toyota GR Cup also has its second race weekend of the year, this time at the iconic Circuit of the Americas. The first race is on Saturday, April 26 at 4:55 p.m. ET, with the second race on Sunday, April 27 at 1:15 p.m. ET. You can watch live at https://www.toyota.com/racing/live-stream.