Brett Winningham - Results from #150

Sam Mayer walked away victorious on Monday in the ARCA Menards Series East opener at New Smyrna Speedway. The 2019 NASCAR K&N East Champion started sixth on the leaderboard and led 28 of the 175 circuits. The victory will mark his fifth career win in the East division.

“I was riding behind him saving tires cause I knew he hadn’t pitted yet,” said winner Sam Mayer in victory lane. I’m definitely going to enjoy this one, beating Ty (Gibbs), and all these other people. Their team is amazing, and beating them is definitely something to be said.”

Mayer held off hard charging Derek Griffith in the closing laps of the 84-mile event. Griffith, piloting the No. 2 Chad Bryant Racing Ford and making his series debut, was popped for pulling up to pit and sent to the rear of the field prior to a restart with a handful of laps left. Before the penalty, Griffith led 144 laps.

“Definitely,” Griffith said after the race when asked if he could’ve caught Sam Mayer with five more laps. “Man, that thing was HOOKED UP, and we didn’t take tires. These General Tires held up really good.”

Mayer leaves the season opener with 12 career top five and top 10 finishes in the East division.

Ty Gibbs rounded out the top three finishers on Monday. The driver of the No. 18 Monster Energy Toyota started fourth and led the field for five laps.

Nick Sanchez and Giovanni Bromante rounded out the top five.

Stephen Nasse, Corey Heim, Parker Retzlaff, Chase Cabre and Max McLaughlin rounded out the top 10.

The race remained calm with single-car incidents until lap 145 when three cars tangled in turn four. Tanner Gray, Mason Diaz and Max McLaughlin came off turn four three wide following a restart on lap 144 and simply ran out of racing room. Tanner Gray’s No. 17 Ford went on its side against the outside retaining wall damaging the catch-fence before landing back on all four wheels. The incident resulted in a lengthy red flag period for fence repair.

Gray finished 18^th while Diaz finished 17^th as a result of the melee. McLaughlin continued and finished 10^th on the lead lap.

Tonight’s race will air on NBCSN at 1:00 p.m. ET. on February 14.

The ARCA Menards Series East will return at Five Flags Speedway on March 14. The event will air live on NBC TrackPass Gold at 8:00 p.m. ET.

Michael Self celebrated in victory lane at Daytona International Speedway on Saturday piloting the No. 25 Toyota with sponsor Sinclair Lubricants. Self, driving for Venturini Motorsports, started on the pole and led 60 of the 80 laps to score his eighth career win in the series.

Self led the first 21 circuits of the event before coming down pit road. The now two-time Daytona winner in the ARCA Racing Series fell to eighth on the leaderboard for the restart on lap 23.

The driver from Utah regained the top spot while under the caution flag on lap 41 and held the lead for the rest of the way.

Self, with 40 career ARCA Racing Series starts, leaves the 2.5-mile Daytona International Speedway with 26 top five and 27 top 10 finishes.

Hailie Deegan sat 0.125-seconds behind race winner Michael Self in the finishing order on Saturday. Deegan, driving the No. 4 Monster Energy Ford, restarted third on the final restart on lap 75. Looking for her first career ARCA Racing Series win, Deegan took the runner-up position one circuit later on lap 76.

She’ll leave the 2.5-mile oval in South Florida with her second top five and fifth top 10 finish.

Drew Dollar rounded out the top three finishers in the Lucas Oil 200 at Daytona. Dollar, piloting the No. 15 Venturini Motorsports Toyota, started the 200-mile race in fifth. The driver from Atlanta sat second early on before being popped for a pit road penalty that relegated him to the 20^th spot for 14 laps.

The No. 15 crew gained 10 positions on lap 39 as a result of a caution flag – putting them 10^th on the leaderboard.

Sean Corr and Thad Moffitt rounded out the top five.

Jason White, Riley Herbst, Willie Mullins, Bret Holmes and Scott Melton rounded out the top 10.

The next event for the series will be at Phoenix Raceway on March 6^th at 7:00 p.m. ET. on FOX Sports 1.

NASCAR unveiled rule changes on Tuesday in preparation for the 2020 NASCAR Cup Series season. The rule changes include changes to downforce at road course and small short tracks one mile in length or shorter. NASCAR hopes that these changes will improve the on-track product going forward.

The changes include the rear spoiler, front splitter overhang and alterations to radiator pan. The new package will be used at six oval tracks and three road courses in 2020.

“When we consider changes to the aero package, we often can look back on our playbook, if you will, from seasons past,” Probst told NASCAR.com, NASCAR Senior Vice President, Innovation and Racing Development. “And there’s obviously some trade-offs that you make between introducing something completely new that the industry has never seen versus something that we have run before where we have a playbook from our side and (teams) have setup books from their end. We felt like we were going to look at aero packages that we have run in the past, and looking back at a lot of competitive metrics that we track, we feel like the 2017 levels of downforce on those types of tracks had pretty good side-by-side racing that our fans enjoyed.

Specs: (via NASCAR.com)

• A significantly smaller rear spoiler, which shrinks from an 8-inch height to 2.75 inches.
• The front splitter’s overhang will now measure a quarter-inch (down from 2 inches), with approximately 2-inch wings (reduced from 10.5 inches).
• Alterations to the radiator pan, removing its vertical fencing in an effort to reduce front-end downforce. The dimensions of the pan remain the same.

The six tracks that will see the new changes include Bristol, Dover, Martinsville, New Hampshire, Phoenix Raceway and Richmond. The three road course events include Charlotte Roval, Sonoma and Watkins Glen.

“Our first and foremost core goal is to deliver great racing, and I think that we constantly evaluate the things that we do on the race track, however and wherever we need to, to improve that situation for them,” said John Probst, “And as part of our normal ongoing critique of ourselves and how we’re doing, we just felt like this was a good opportunity for us to improve the on-track product at the short tracks and road courses.”

Stewart Friesen locked himself into the Round of 4 at Homestead-Miami Speedway on Friday by winning the Lucas Oil 150 at ISM Raceway. Friesen, who will race for a championship next week in South Florida, led 44 of the 150 circuits en route to his second career NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series win.

The win did not come easy for the driver from Canada as he was popped for a start violation at the initial start of the race. Friesen, the second-place starter, beat pole sitter Austin Hill to the start-finish line and had to serve a pass-through penalty. Luckily for Friesen, second-place finisher Brandon Jones brought out the first yellow in turn two on lap six that sent Friesen to the rear instead of a pass-through on pit road.

Fresen goes into the season-finale next week with 12 top five and 16 top 10 finishes in 2019.

Brandon Jones, winner of stage two, started seventh on the leaderboard and led 36 of the 150 circuits. The driver for Kyle Busch Motorsports, making his fifth truck series appearance of 2019, sat 0.860 seconds behind the winner and finished stage one in ninth.

Chandler Smith made his fourth appearance in the series at ISM Raceway in 2019. The driver for Kyle Busch Motorsports will leave the one-mile oval with a third-place finish following a sixth-place start.

Ben Rhodes, winner of stage one, and Grant Enfinger rounded out the top five.

Matt Crafton, Harrison Burton, Johnny Sauter, Ross Chastain and Brett Moffitt rounded out the top 10.

Four drivers move into the Round of 4 at Homestead-Miami Speedway while two drivers were eliminated on Friday at ISM Raceway. Moving on will be winner Stewart Friesen, reigning series champion Brett Moffitt, Ross Chastain and two-time series champion Matt Crafton. Eliminated was 13^th-place finisher Austin Hill and 26^th-place finisher Tyler Ankrum.

The series will head to Homestead-Miami Speedway for the 2019 season finale on November 15th. The Ford EcoBoost 200 will air live on FS1 and MRN Radio at 8:00 p.m. ET.

Derek Kraus will start on pole for Saturday’s NAPA ENEOS 150 at Kern County Raceway Park in Bakersfield, CA. Kraus, piloting the No. 16 NAPA Auto Parts Toyota, earned his eighth career K&N West pole at the half-mile paved oval.

The driver from Wisconsin enters the night leading the K&N West driver standings by 40 points over second-place qualifier Trevor Huddleston. Huddleston sat 0.064 seconds behind Kraus on the leaderboard

Kraus enters the penultimate race of 2019 with four victories, nine top fives and 11 top 10 finishes.

Hailie Deegan rounded out the top three qualifiers in the No. 19 NAPA Power Premium / Monster Toyota. Deegan posted an 18.363 and sat 0.081 seconds behind the pole winner.

Deegan enters Kern County Raceway with six top five and nine top 10 finishes along with two wins.

Brittney Zamora and Jagger Jones rounded out the top five in qualifying.

The NAPA ENEOS 150 will air live on FansChoice.TV at 10:00 p.m. ET.

Todd Gilliland left Martinsville Speedway on Saturday with his first career NASCAR National Series victory in a thrilling finish on the last lap. Gilliland, piloting the No. 4 Mobil 1 Toyota for Kyle Busch Motorsports, started the afternoon 11^th and finished stage one in 11^th and stage two in 12^th.

“It feels amazing. This place is really hard to win at. This Mobil 1 Toyota Tundra is not as pretty as we hoped it would be when we crossed the start-finish line, but man, it looks even better with water and Gatorade on it,” said Gilliland after the race. “Can’t thank JBL, Toyota, all the fans enough. Thank you guys for sitting around. I think that was a good finish. I don’t really know. Luckily we were out front. Just wish we could’ve been a little bit faster all weekend, but as a driver that’s what you always hope for and this thing was fast enough today.”

Jordan Anderson, Gus Dean and Natalie Decker tangled in turn two with four circuits remaining to send the event into NASCAR overtime. Gilliland later held off Ross Chastain on the restart to win the NASCAR Hall of Fame 200 at the historic track. Chastain, looking to advance into the Round of 4 at Homestead-Miami Speedway, finished second.

Gilliland will go into ISM Raceway with six top five and 13 top 10 finishes.

“I’d say we didn’t have quite the speed just overall. To start the race, I was really tight. We made one pit stop and made it a lot, a lot better where I could contend for probably top five and then we were in a wreck, knocked the nose in, knocked the whole right-side in,” Gilliland later added. “We were going to stay out, but we decided that the tires were probably rubbed, so we came in and got four fresh tires and made even more adjustments. Man, I think we made our truck a ton better throughout the race, played the pace of the whole race really well. After we got that last set of tires, just picked people off kind of methodically. Forty laps is a long time here. Even at the end when we were up in like fourth or fifth. It was just about controlling it from there and just being smart.”

Chastain will leave the 0.526-mile oval with his ninth top five and 17^th top 10 finish of 2019. The driver of the No. 45 CarShield Chevrolet finished stage one in 10^th and fourth in stage two and led 68 of the 201 circuits.

Johnny Sauter sat third when the checkered flag waved on Saturday. The Wisconsin native started sixth and led one circuit in his No. 13 Tenda Heal Ford – earning his fourth top five of the season.

Grant Enfinger and Timmy Hill rounded out the top five.

Stewart Friesen, John Hunter Nemechek, Danny Bohn, Jeb Burton and Codie Rohrbaugh took home finishes inside the top 10.

Several NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series Playoff drivers found themselves caught in calamity or technical issues in the NASCAR Hall of Fame 200. Matt Crafton suffered a battery issue that put the No. 88 Menards Ford eight laps down. The two-time champion in the series went on to finish 23^rd.

Playoff driver Brett Moffitt, winner of stage one and reigning series champion, led 80 laps before his day ended on lap 122. Moffitt tangled with eight other vehicles in turn two that ended the day for the No. 24 Chevrolet team. Tyler Dippel and Sam Mayer had their days end as a result of the incident.

Johnny Sauter and Stewart Friesen later tangled on lap 150 in turn two. Both drivers continued and later finished third and sixth on the leaderboard.

The series will have another off weekend before they return at ISM Raceway on November 8. The Lucas Oil 150 will air live on FS1 at 8:30 p.m. ET.

Kaulig Racing and Ross Chastain announced a deal last Tuesday that will put Chastain behind the wheel of the No. 10 Chevrolet full-time in the NASCAR XFINITY Series in 2020. The deal means that the small XFINITY team will field two full-time entries next season with Justin Haley in its No. 11 Chevrolet.

The deal comes while Chastain seeks a driver championship in the NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series – piloting the No. 45 Chevrolet with Niece Motorsports. Chastain spoke at Kansas Speedway on how the deal in 2020 with Kaulig Racing will help him confidence wise while racing for a championship in the truck series.

"This is the most confidence I’ve ever had- I sleep better at night. I still don’t sleep great, but better at night than I ever had. Just hearing the confidence in my guys and Chris and everyone at Nutrien Ag Solution, as we’re here for the long haul. Short term, more races in the 10 car here at Texas and those truck races; we have to go execute. And we feel like the confidence at Niece Motorsports is high. The parts and pieces, just like Chris and Matt; what Al Niece have given my group, with the No. 45 and 44, what they’ve given us to go race is everything we need."

Four of the five last Gander Outdoors Truck Series races have ended in a top-five finish for the Florida native – including a trip to victory lane at Michigan International Speedway. Chastain later took home two runner-up finishes at Bristol Motor Speedway and Las Vegas Motor Speedway along with a third-place finish at Canadian Tire Motorsports Park.

Chastain’s day was cut short the last time out because of an accident at Talladega Superspeedway. The driver of the No. 45 Chevrolet started 17^th and finished 22^nd due to an incident involving nine other trucks in turn four.

“I love racing at Martinsville,” said Chastain on the upcoming race at Martinsville. “This is a tough, fun track and I’m really looking forward to this weekend’s race.  We have a little bit of ground to make up after what happened at Talladega, so I’m going to do everything I can to put this CarShield Chevrolet in Victory Lane and lock these Niece Motorsports boys and girls into the final round of the playoffs.”

In addition to the No. 45 Chevrolet in the truck series, the driver competed in numerous starts across the NASCAR XFINITY and Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series this season with Kaulig Racing and JD Motorsports; along with Premium Motorsports in the cup series.

In 18 races behind the wheel of a NASCAR XFINITY Series car, Chastain made a trip to victory lane at Daytona International Speedway in July with Kaulig Racing, along with four top 10 finishes.

Chris Rice, co-owner of Kaulig Racing, spoke where the team stands as they close 2019 and look ahead to 2020 with two full-time XFINITY Series entries.

“We hired AJ Allmendinger to come in. I know our race team is not ready to win at certain racetracks, so we need help to do that,” said Rice. “Justin Haley, somebody that can be so good at making points and doing things, and we get into the playoffs and we kind of failed him. And I have to pick the guys up"

Kaulig Racing, in 2019, goes into Texas Motor Speedway next week having two wins across the organization. The team, between five drivers and 46 individual starts this year, has eight top five and 27 top 10s.

“Chris Rice and Matt Kaulig, they’re investing into this team, they came into this series; I don’t think a lot of people knew what to think, but they’re here and they’re investing,” said Chastain. “And the stuff like, the terrible thing that happened a few days ago, doesn’t slow them down.”

Chastain ended the afternoon at Kansas Speedway 10^th in Saturday’s Kansas Lottery 300. The No. 10 crew faced adversity going into the weekend as the hauler was involved in a wreck en route to Kansas Speedway that destroyed both the primary and backup cars. The crew quickly pulled the necessary resources together with help from Richard Childress Racing to field the teams second entry.

Kaulig Racing will field two full-time entries with Haley and Chastain in 2020 – along with an occasional third entry.

Chastain sits sixth in points going into this weekend’s truck series race at Martinsville Speedway. He is one of several drivers looking to advance into the Round of 4 at Homestead-Miami Speedway.

Denny Hamlin won a wild Hollywood Casino 400 at Kansas Speedway on Sunday by surviving two NASCAR Overtime attempts en route to his second Kansas victory. Hamlin, the 23^rd-place starter, sat eighth in stage one and claimed stage two in his No. 11 FedEx Toyota for Joe Gibbs Racing and led 51 circuits.

The win comes one week ahead of Martinsville Speedway – a track where Hamlin holds five career victories at.

“Yeah, I love where we are at, no doubt about it,” said Hamlin. “I cannot wait to get to Martinsville. This week was just supposed to be a fun week for us, kind of check things out and make sure that we are good once we get down the road as we get to other tracks and I’m pretty happy about where we are at.”

The win did not come easy for the Virginia driver as he survived two overtime attempts with pressure from Chase Elliott and teammate Kyle Busch right on his back bumper.

With two laps remaining, Bubba Wallace and Matt Tifft tangled in turn two, drawing the sixth caution flag of the day. Tifft continued and finished 25^th while Wallace was done for the day in 35^th.

Just before Hamlin took the white flag as the leader, a five-car incident involved Brad Keselowski, Austin Dillon, Joey Logano, Daniel Suarez and Daniel Hemric on the frontstretch. Suarez and Hemric days were done while the other three continued.

“It’s step-by-step, week-by-week,” Hamlin continued. “We are not getting too far ahead of ourselves. We concentrate every week as if it’s the most important one, and this win here shows that.”

Hamlin, who led 153 of the 277 laps, will leave the 1.5-mile Kansas oval with five wins, 17 top five and 21 top 10 finishes in 32 completed events.

Chase Elliott took the checkered flag in second after starting the afternoon in 14^th. The No. 9 Chevrolet led the field for four circuits and sat 0.128 seconds behind the race winner.

The Georgia native will leave the track with his 11^th top five and 15^th top 10 finish in 2019.

Kyle Busch, piloting the No. 18 M&M’s Toyota, will leave with the third spot. Busch, a native of Las Vegas, finished fifth in stage one and 10^th in stage two and entered the afternoon looking to score his fifth Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series victory.

Kurt Busch and William Byron rounded out the top five.

Martin Truex Jr., Erik Jones, Clint Bowyer, Kevin Harvick and Jimmie Johnson rounded out the top 10 finishers.

Brad Keselowski, William Byron, Alex Bowman and Clint Bowyer were eliminated from the Playoffs.

Moving on into the Round of Eight will be Kyle Larson, Ryan Blaney, Kyle Busch, Martin Truex Jr., Denny Hamlin, Kevin Harvick, Joey Logano and Chase Elliott.

The next race for the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series will be October 27^th at Martinsville Speedway. The First Data 500 will air live on NBCSN at 3:00 p.m. ET.

Brandon Jones scored his first career NASCAR National Series victory on Saturday at the 1.5-mile Kansas Speedway. Jones, piloting the No. 19 Flow Toyota, started second on the leaderboard for the Kansas Lottery 300 and led only 10 laps of the event.

“This is incredible. I knew this was going to happen – that we were going to come here and have an amazing run like we did today,” said Jones after the race. It’s only because of those guys here. They have fought with me for a long time, and this feels way better because it has been tough to get to this point. I don’t think I could have done this without the manufacturer. I wish my parents were here. They have been through a bunch of wins with me. All-in-all, I cannot wait to celebrate with these guys.”

The win did not come easy for the Georgia native as he survived a late-race restart with five laps to go. Jones previously took the lead on a restart with 10 laps left after a wad of cars raced for the second position that allowed the No. 19 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota to advance the gap even further.

“I’m not going to lie about this. My foot was literally shaking on the accelerator on that last lap,” said Jones regarding the final laps of the race. “I’m not even sure if I was wide open at the time, when I was doing it. There was a lot of nerves. A lot of emotion going through my mind, but I saw it coming and got pretty pumped.”

Noah Gragson and Joey Gase had incidents in turn one that brought out the yellow flag with seven circuits to go. Gragson went on to finish 13^th while Gase took home the 32^nd spot.

Jones will leave Kansas with five top five and 14 top 10 finishes through 30 completed races.

Tyler Reddick sat second when the checkered flag waved while in the process of catching race winner Brandon Jones. Reddick, finishing stage one in fourth and stage two in third, was involved in a post-race scuffle with 11^th place finisher and stage two winner Cole Custer after the race because of a move made on the track. The two exchanged words while putting hands on each other after the event on pit road.

The second-place finish in the Kansas Lottery 300 marks Reddick’s 22^nd top five and 25^th top 10 finish of 2019.

Chase Briscoe, leading 33 of the 200 circuits on Saturday, crossed the line in third. The driver of the No. 98 Ford sat seventh in stage one and fifth in stage two.

Michael Annett, who started 38^th on the leaderboard, and Justin Allgaier, who started seventh, rounded out the top five.

Jeremy Clements, Justin Haley, John Hunter Nemechek, Ryan Sieg and Ross Chastain rounded out the top 10.

Several contenders were involved in incidents throughout the 200-lap event. The second yellow flag of the afternoon involved Austin Cindric and Harrison Burton in turn four. The incident ended the day for Burton while Cindric continued to a 25^th-place finish.

On lap 164, John Hunter Nemechek ran into an issue in turn two. The No. 23 Chevrolet, after starting 15^th on the leaderboard, went on to an eighth-place run.

On lap 185, with 15 laps remaining, leaders Chase Briscoe and Christopher Bell were involved in an incident with a lap car of Garrett Smithley on the frontstretch. Bell, winner of stage one, and Briscoe continued while Smithley went behind the wall following the three-car incident. Briscoe finished third while Bell finished the afternoon in 12^th.

The series will take another weekend off before returning at Texas Motor Speedway on November 2^nd. The O’Reilly Auto Parts 300 will take place at 8:30 p.m. ET. live on NBCSN.

Christian Eckes took home the checkered flag at Kansas Speedway on Friday and the 2019 ARCA Menards Series championship. Eckes, piloting the No. 15 JBL Audio Toyota for Venturini Motorsports, started 11^th and led the field for 43 of the 100 laps.

The series points battle coming into the 1.5-mile oval was between Michael Self and Eckes. Self, piloting the No. 25 Toyota for Venturini Motorsports, finished second and led the most circuits of any driver in the Kansas ARCA 150.

Eckes will finish the championship season with four victories, 13 top five and 17 top 10 finishes in the 20-race season. As for Michael Self, he’ll finish the year with four victories, 14 top five and 15 top 10 finishes.

2020 plans for Christian Eckes and Michael Self have not been officially announced. It is expected that Eckes will move up into the NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series in 2020.

Ty Majeski will leave the Kansas oval with a third-place finish in the No. 22 Ford. Majeski, starting the night in third, came into the evening with three victories in 19 starts in 2019.

Bret Holmes and Travis Braden rounded out the top five finishers.

Taking home top 10 finishes were Tanner Gray, Drew Dollar, Hailie Deegan, Joe Graf Jr. and Gus Dean.

The next race for the ARCA Menards Series will be at Daytona International Speedway on February 8^th.