Shaking off the disappointment of Bristol (Tenn.) Motor Speedway last month, NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series (NGOTS) rookie Codie Rohrbaugh and his CR7 Motorsports are refocused and reenergized heading to Las Vegas (Nev.) Motor Speedway for Friday night’s World of Westgate 200.
After skipping the spring Las Vegas Truck Series race, Rohrbaugh and his Doug George led team head to the 1.5-mile speedway ready to place their bets and give an “all in” performance in hopes of the team’s first career top-10 finish.
“Excited to go to Las Vegas,” said Rohrbaugh. “It’s a neat place from a tourist standpoint, but Las Vegas Motor Speedway is also a great place to race. It’s fast speeds, tight corners and intense action. Hopefully, all our bad luck is behind us this season and we can surge ahead for our remaining races this season.”
Running a limited schedule this season, Mooresville, N.C.-based CR7 Motorsports is focused on running four of the remaining five races this year. After skipping the penultimate race of the year at ISM (Ariz.) Raceway, the team will take the checkered flag at Homestead-Miami (Fla.) Speedway in November.
“We’re not running for points, so we’re trying some things to improve on our-track performance and deliverance,” added Rohrbaugh.
“Qualifying certainly has been our achilles heel. We’ve been so used to group qualifying and now you have just one or two laps to get it done and if you have a bobble like we did at Bristol, it’s the difference from making the race or sitting on the sidelines.
“We know where we need to improve, and we’re determined to show everyone how we’re going to improve between Las Vegas and Homestead and give us a boost heading into the off-season and prepare for 2020.”
While the 25-year-old Rohrbaugh has never been to Las Vegas, he’s relying not on his prior experience at the other intermediate race tracks to help with his learning curve, but the advice and guidance from crew chief George.
“There’s always some apprehensive when you visit a track for the first time,” explained Rohrbaugh. “We’ll probably take it easy for the first couple of runs just to make sure I’m comfortable and then we’ll get aggressive.
“I think Las Vegas has shown again and again how dependent the race is on drafting and I expect no different on Friday night. Hopefully, we can keep our nose clean and leave Las Vegas accomplishing our goal of earning a top-10 finish.”
CR7 Motorsports has seven NGOTS starts to their credit with a career-best finish of 14th at Kentucky Speedway (July 2019). A 14th place qualifying effort at Charlotte (N.C.) Motor Speedway (May 2019) is the team’s best time trials effort to date.
In 20 career ARCA starts, Rohrbaugh has a best finish of seventh twice at Pocono (Pa.) Raceway (July 2018 and Daytona (Fla.) International Speedway (February 2019). He has qualified a career-best fourth on four different occasions most recently at Kansas Speedway (Oct. 2018).
Marketing partnership(s) opportunities are available for the No. 7 Grant County Mulch Chevrolet and No. 9 Grant County Mulch Chevrolet for the 2019 ARCA Menards Series and NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series seasons and beyond. Interested inquiries are encouraged to contact at [email protected] or 304.257.8783.
Following Las Vegas (Nev.) Motor Speedway, CR7 Motorsports plans to return to the Gander Truck Series scene at Talladega (Ala.) Superspeedway on Oct. 12, 2019.
The World of Westgate 200 (134 laps | 201 miles) is the 19th of 23 races on the 2019 NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series schedule. Practice begins on Fri., Sept. 13 from 8:05 a.m. – 9:55 a.m. Qualifying is set for later in the day beginning at 2:35 p.m. The 32-truck field will take the green flag shortly after 6:00 p.m. with live coverage on FOX Sports 1 (FS1), the Motor Racing Network (Radio) and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio (Satellite Radio, Channel 90). All times are local (Pacific).
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