David Starr made a strong charge from his 23rd starting spot to finish 11th in the rain shortened NASCAR Camping World Truck Series Ford 200 at the Homestead-Miami Speedway on Friday evening. David charged from 18th to 11th over the last 20 laps before the rains came and shortened the race 15 laps before the scheduled 134 laps.
Rain showers forced NASCAR officials to cancel qualifying so the trucks were lined up by time from the morning practice session giving Starr the 23rd starting spot for the season ending race.
David would not stay in 23rd for long as he moved his way up to 18th when a competition caution was displayed on lap 20. A problem on the first pitstop dropped the Zachry Toyota back to 28th challenging David to work his way to the front of the 36-truck field.
As he made his way through heavy traffic, David was very fortunate to avoid a spinning German Quiroga on lap 31 avoiding some of the bad luck that has plagued the team this season. He restarted from 20th place when the green flew again on lap 35 and made a bold move on the restart charging up to fifteenth before settling into 18th place where he would stay through a long green flag run that included the full field making green flag stops.
On lap 98 a caution would slow the field for the last time and Starr would restart the Zachry Toyota 18th as the trucks were set for a 36-lap run to the end of the seasons last race.
David charged through the field after the restart, powering his way toward the top-ten moving to 14th on lap 110 and challenging Austin Dillon for tenth when the rain showers came and shortened the race on lap 117. Johnny Sauter held of a charge by Denny Hamlin as the rains began and won the race.
“The finish result does not show how good our truck was,” Starr said. “The SS Green Light team did a great job. We had a hiccup on the first stop and that dropped us all the way to the back but we didn’t give up.”
“When they dropped the green after the last caution our Zachry Toyota was like a rocket ship. I mean the truck was awesome and it was unfortunate the rains came because I felt we had a 7th or 8th place truck. If the caution had come out and we got back some of the real estate, I felt we had a truck capable of getting up to the top-five.”
“It was a great race, the finish does not totally show how great our Zachry Tundra was, we just didn’t need the rain at the end.”
Starr finished thirteenth in the NCWTS driver’s standings behind Austin Dillon.
“Overall it was a great season, although we did not live up to our expectation, we had some bad luck and we went through some growing pains; the whole team stuck together, nobody complained or pointed fingers and we learned a lot. You can take everything we learned and apply it to next year and come out stronger. I want to thank everyone who supported us this season including Zachry, NCCER Build Your Future Campaign, Allegro, Advocare, Akzo Nobel and ASI Limited.”
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