Story By: SAM MAHONEY / TOYOTA RACING – DARLINGTON, SC – In just his second start of the season, Colby Howard ran an impressive race – running nearly the entire final stage inside the top-10 before finishing seventh. For the South Carolina-native, it is his second-best career Truck Series finish – just behind a top-five run in the Daytona season opener last year.
Howard’s seventh was the first of three top-10 finishes for TRICON Garage with Taylor Gray in eighth and Tanner Gray in 10th.
Fellow TRICON Garage driver Corey Heim started second and led 77 of the first 93 laps, while picking up two Playoff points before being involved in an on-track incident in the early part of the third stage that also ended the night for his teammate, Dean Thompson.
Toyota Racing Post-Race Recap
NASCAR CRAFTSMAN Truck Series
Darlington Raceway
Race 9 of 23 – 147 Laps, 200.802 Miles
TOYOTA FINISHING POSITIONS
1st, Ross Chastain*
2nd, Nick Sanchez*
3rd, Ben Rhodes*
4th, Christian Eckes*
5th, Ty Majeski*
7th, COLBY HOWARD
8th, TAYLOR GRAY
10th, TANNER GRAY
13th, TIMMY HILL
14th, STEWART FRIESEN
28th, COREY HEIM
29th, DEAN THOMPSON
*non-Toyota driver
TOYOTA QUOTES
COLBY HOWARD, No. 1 Coastal Sports Cards Toyota Tundra TRD Pro, TRICON Garage
Finishing Position: 7th
Can you tell us about this strong run and that final restart?
“It was an uphill battle all night with our Coastal Sports Cards Tundra. We started in the midpack, and we drove our way up to 13th, and we had a bad pit stop – the jack dropped – and we went back to about 20th. We drove all the way back up there through all of these guys out here, and dodged a pretty big wreck coming off of (turn) two – that was huge for us. That really put us in a good position. We were just running it out, and had that late caution, and people were just not using their heads. It could have been a really special night.”
COREY HEIM, No. 11 Safelite Toyota Tundra TRD Pro, TRICON Garage
Finishing Position: 28th
What happened out there?
“It is certainly disappointing. I felt like we had a really good Safelite Tundra TRD Pro. We made it a lot better throughout the race. I thought we got really tight in stage one, and we made it better in stage two and was looking forward to making it better in stage three and kind of running away with that one. Unfortunately, it wasn’t that easy. We got taken out, and that is part of it.”
DEAN THOMPSON, No. 5 Thompson Pipe Group Toyota Tundra TRD Pro, TRICON Garage
Finishing Position: 29th
What happened?
“The truck just got really free. These trucks race so free on restarts, and hard racing turned into a wrecked truck. TRICON Garage brought me a really good Thompson Pipe Group Tundra. We got some stage points, and ran really well in stage two. I feel like we could have finished well too, just hard racing.”