It was a one day show for the NASCAR XFINITY Series this weekend at Richmond Raceway. It’s not too often the fans get to enjoy all of the on track activities on the same day. First practice started bright and early at 8:00am and second practice ended at 10:25am. Then the team had a long 6 hours to get the car ready and through tech for the ToyotaCare 250 qualifying. After the first run in qualifying Joey and the team were not satisfied with the lap and said it was too tight. The team made a few adjustments, cooled it down and sent him back out. Joey jumped up to 10th and finished 11th in the first round! When qualifying was all said and done, the Sparks Energy Chevrolet qualified for the show in 23rd.
The sun started to set on a beautiful night in Richmond, Virginia and the first night race of the 2018 campaign was under way. It didn’t take long to draw the first caution of the night, this one for the 52 of David Starr. They went back to green shortly with 51 laps remaining in the stage. The race would remain that way until lap 64, when the 45 of Josh Bilicki got into the wall drawing our second caution. In that caution, Joey had radioed to Crew Chief Patrick Donahue that he needed more forward drive. With there only being 6 laps remaining in the stage when they were to go back to green, Donahue elected to wave pit road. The green and white checkered flag had waved concluding stage one and Gase had worked up his way up to 21st.
In between stages, he brought the Sparks Energy Chevrolet down pit road for tires, a round in the left rear and some packer to help give him some forward drive. After a solid pit stop, Joey would restart stage two in 23rd.
They went green for the entire second stage, but about 27 laps in to the 75 lap stage Gase had come over the radio to tell Donahue that he was too free on entry. Race leader Elliot Sadler had caught the 35 putting them a lap down right before the end of the stage. However, Gase being the first car a lap down, received the lucky dog and would restart on the lead lap. With the notes Joey had relayed, CC Donahue elected to pull out some packer in the left front, put one round in the right rear and adjust the tire pressures.
Shortly after they had gone green for the final stage, another caution had come out. This time for the 7 of Justin Allgaier getting sideways in the middle of the front stretch. Luckily he didn’t collect any others up as he was right in the middle of the action. Joey and spotter Pepper did a great job navigating through the mess to avoid any damage.
They went back to green, and this run Joey had seemed to be running a lot better as he found his way up to 18th. But with about 50 laps remaining, he came over the radio and said he’s starting to lose power steering. As the race progressed, the power steering had completely gone with about 20 laps remaining. Hanging tough for the final 20 laps, Gase was getting quite the workout but still brought the Sparks Energy Chevrolet to the checkered with a solid 22nd place finish.
Another solid weekend for Joey and Go Green Racing was in the books. “We had a great car to start off the final stage and we worked our way up in the top 20 after running around 22nd for most of the race. It was a solid run and ended up bringing the Sparks Energy Chevrolet home in 22nd,” said Gase. “We’re continuing to get better and better. Next weekend is a big weekend for us with the Sparks Energy 300, so we’ve got to keep moving forward and focus on Talladega.”
Joey Gase PR
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