Hornaday Earns Fifth Top-10 Finish of Season at Pocono Raceway

 

For the 11th race of the 2013 season, the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series (NCWTS) headed north to Pocono Raceway for the Pocono Mountains 125. With Mother Nature forcing NASCAR to cancel qualifying, the starting line up was set by the first practice session, lining Ron Hornaday and the No. 9 Smokey Mountain Herbal Snuff team up in the 21st position.

 

As the race got under way for 50 laps around the 2.5-mile raceway, it was immediately slowed for the first caution of the race for a spin on lap one. Settling back into the 21st position, the race restarted on lap three and with a strong restart, Hornaday passed four competitors on the restart to move into the 17th position on lap five.

 

Patiently making his moves on competitors, Hornaday moved into the top 15 on lap eight and set his eyes on the leaders.

 

With the race continuing under a long green-flag run, teams began to make green-flag pit stops on lap 21 with Hornaday scored in the 12th position. Crew chief Bruce Cook called Hornaday to pit road at the halfway point of the Pocono Mountains 125 for right-side tires and fuel. Once the field cycled through pit stops, Hornaday was running in the 15th spot.

 

Running his fastest laps of the race, Hornaday picked off one competitor at a time to move into the top 10 for the first time on lap 45 with five scheduled laps remaining in the Pocono Mountains 125. 

 

Surviving two late cautions that forced the race into overtime and making evasive moves to avoid spins in front of his No. 9 Smokey Mountain Chevrolet, Hornaday was able to cross the finish line solidly in the sixth position to earn his fifth top-10 finish of the season.

 

Hornaday Hype:

 

“Pocono Raceway is the most unique track I have visited during my rookie season in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series.  To cap off my first race weekend at the Tricky Triangle with a top-five in the ARCA Racing Series and my first top-10 finish in the NCWTS was amazing.  My Qore-24 team worked through adversity having to bring out the back up truck early in practice and I had to overcome starting positions deep in the field of both events because the ever changing weather cancelled qualifying.”

 

NTS Motorsports PR