Racing is not just about high-performance cars and spectacular professional drivers. It is also not just about second hand vehicles fully checked and modified, if necessary, for amateur drivers. Racing goes beyond those things. Racing can be an avenue for charity, too.
Derek Kraus needed only to start the NASCAR K&N Pro Series West (NKNPSW) race at ISM Raceway to be declared the series champion on Saturday evening. When the green flag waved, it was official, and the 18-year-old Camry driver became the fourth Toyota driver to capture a NKNPSW driver’s title.
The good news for Austin Cindric was that he overcame a speeding penalty to score a sixth-place finish Saturday afternoon at ISM Raceway, his 23rd top-10 in 32 races this season and his third at the one-mile Arizona speedway. The not so good news: despite the tremendous effort, it wasn’t enough to for the young driver to transfer into the Championship 4 next week at Homestead-Miami Speedway.
Nemechek started the race from the 13th-position and made his way into the ninth-position to finish out Stage One.
Bell, Custer, Reddick and Allgaier will race for a championship after Phoenix cutoff race is complete.
COLE CUSTER, No. 00 Haas Automation Ford Mustang – WHAT WAS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN YOU AND THE 7? “I kind of struggled with the brake pedal all day. I was just saving my brakes until like 15 to go and I just let it have it there at the end. I got to close in, but I didn’t quite have enough. Our Haas Automation Mustang, I mean that was probably the best we’ve been at Phoenix so far, but we just kind of struggled trying to get the whole run together.”
Christopher Bell led over half of the 200-lap race, swept the stages and will advance to Homestead to battle for the NXS championship next weekend.
Kyle Busch edges Joey Logano and other Playoff drivers to start out front in Sunday's Bluegreen Vacations 500 at ISM Raceway.
BRAD KESELOWSKI, No. 2 Miller Lite Ford Mustang – WHAT DID YOU THINK ABOUT ROGER BUYING IMS? “It came out of left field. I had no idea it was coming. I knew he was working on something big when he wasn’t at Martinsville or Texas. I’ve learned RP and when he’s not at moments like that, something really big is about to go down. I didn’t know what it was, it could have been a number of things, but that was not on my list of things that I thought it could be.”
KYLE LARSON, NO. 42 CLOVER CAMARO ZL1 – Qualified 5th DO YOU HAVE A CAR CAPABLE OF WINNING HERE THIS WEEKEND? “There’s definitely guys that are faster than I am. I feel like I’m a bit like a fifth to seventh place car after practice. I felt like the 11 (Denny Hamlin) was, by far, the best. But I almost won here in 2017 and I had a third to fifth place car. We just had some restarts there late and lined up in the right position. Anything can happen, so we’ll see. I’m hopeful.”
Kyle Busch earned his first pole position of the season and will lead the field to the green in Sunday’s Cup Series race at ISM Raceway, a track he’s won the last two races at. All three Toyota Playoff drivers will start the 312 lap race from the first two rows.
AVONDALE, Ariz. — In the first two races of the Round of 8, the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series has faced two controversial spins by Joey Logano and Bubba Wallace. Logano has dodged the question about the spin, but Wallace opened up this weekend about his spin at Texas Motor Speedway.