Information By: TOYOTA GAZOO RACING – KANSAS CITY, KS – Corey Heim overcame multiple issues to lead Toyota with a top-five in the NASCAR Truck Series race at Kansas Speedway on Saturday evening.
Heim, who won the first stage, restarted 21st with 23 laps to go after a penalty on the prior restart. The Toyota Development Driver charged the field to a fourth-place finish.
Heim’s fourth led four straight Tundras across the finish line as Rookie of the Year leader Gio Ruggiero finished fifth, Stewart Friesen was scored sixth and Xfinity Series regular Brandon Jones earned a seventh-place run.
Toyota GAZOO Racing Post-Race Recap
NASCAR CRAFTSMAN Truck Series (NCTS)
Kansas Motor Speedway
Race 9 of 23 – 201 Miles, 134 Laps
TOYOTA FINISHING POSITIONS
- 1st, Carson Hocevar*
- 2nd, Layne Riggs*
- 3rd, William Bryron*
- 4th, COREY HEIM
- 5th, GIO RUGGIERO
- 6th, STEWART FRIESEN
- 7th, BRANDON JONES
- 21st, TONI BREIDINGER
- 28th, TANNER GRAY
*non-Toyota driver
TOYOTA QUOTES
COREY HEIM, No. 11 Safelite + Foster Love Toyota Tundra TRD Pro, TRICON Garage
Finishing Position: 4th
Fourth-place finish for Corey Heim, after you found everything that could go wrong tonight. Can you describe that race?
“Yeah, for sure. Started out with that pit gun breaking – no fault to my pit crew there. They did an awesome job all night. It seemed like a situational kind of deal there and then caught on the exact wrong time on the green flag cycle – had to take the wave and start from the back again, and got out of line for a penalty on my part. Like you said, a roller coaster kind of day today. Very proud of everyone at TRICON Garage and Toyota. This Safelite, Foster Love Tundra was really fast today. I feel like we made a lot of gains on it throughout the race. We kind of struggled more in dirty air than I thought we would coming into this race, but regardless, I think we were still the best truck today. Certainly, disappointing after being able to sweep the year last year, but we will move forward.”
GIO RUGGIERO, No. 17 First Auto Group Toyota Tundra TRD Pro, TRICON Garage
Finishing Position: 5th
Scored a top-five in your first time here at Kansas in a truck. What did you learn?
“I learned it is definitely pretty racy, especially on the restarts here – using all of the lanes up. It gets pretty aggressive there. That was fun. I tried to dig all day, and fight really hard with our First Auto Group Tundra. We were in the back for a while, so just proud of my guys for never giving up. The pit crew did a really good job. We had some really solid stops and kept picking up spots on pit road, so that helped us as well, so it was a step in the right direction for sure, but we need to run better next weekend.”