No. 54 Monster Energy Toyota GR Supra News and Notes
- ALREADY PLAYOFF BOUND: By winning the Las Vegas, Atlanta, Richmond and Road America NASCAR Xfinity Series races, Ty Gibbs has qualified for the Xfinity playoffs which will begin at Texas Motor Speedway on Sept. 24.
- INDIANAPOLIS: Gibbs started fifth, led four laps and finished 19th in his only NASCAR Xfinity start last year at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course.
- ONE OF THIRTY-SEVEN: Gibbs made his first career NASCAR Cup Series start last week at Pocono Raceway for 23XI Racing. Gibbs is the 37th driver younger than 20-years old to make a Cup Series start. Gibbs started at the rear of the field, but completed all 160 laps and finished an impressive 16th.
- NEW RECORD: Gibbs is the youngest driver ever to reach eight victories in the NASCAR Xfinity Series at age 19 years 8 months and 4 weeks. The previous record was held by Joey Logano.
- 2021: Gibbs completed in only 18 Xfinity races in 2021, but won four races and finished 13th in the Xfinity Series final driver point standings. That earned him the Xfinity Rookie of the Year award.
- WHAT A DEBUT: In Gibbs’ Xfinity Series debut in February 2021 at the Daytona Road Course, he led 14 of the 56 laps en route to his first career Xfinity Series win. Gibbs became the youngest driver to win a Xfinity road course race at 18 years, 4 months, 16 days. The Charlotte, N.C., native also became the second-youngest winner in Xfinity Series history after Joey Logano who won in June 2008 at Kentucky Speedway in Sparta when he was 18 years and 21 days old.
- IN GOOD COMPANY: Gibbs is the sixth driver to win in his Xfinity Series debut, joining Dale Earnhardt, Joe Ruttman, Ricky Rudd, Terry Labonte and Kurt Busch. Those five drivers had already driven in the NASCAR Cup Series before racing in the Xfinity Series.
- ARCA CHAMPIONS: Gibbs became the 2021 ARCA Menard Series Champions on the strength of 10 wins, plus one win each in ARCA West and ARCA East.
- ATOP THE PIT BOX: Veteran crew chief Gayle will oversee the No. 54 team’s efforts in the 2022 season. Gale, who is from Little Rock, Arkansas, has led his drivers to two NASCAR Cup Series victories and 34 Xfinity Series wins. The list of drivers Gayle has visited victory lane with includes Gibbs, Kyle Busch, Denny Hamlin, Sam Hornish Jr., Erik Jones, Elliott Sadler, Christopher Bell and John Hunter Nemechek.
- JGR AT INDIANAPOLIS ROAD COURSE: Joe Gibbs Racing (JGR) has seven total starts at Indianapolis in Xfinity competition with one top-10 finish and the team has led six laps.
- RACE INFO: The NASCAR Xfinity Series race at Indianapolis is scheduled for 3:30 pm EDT on Saturday, July 30 and will be broadcast on NBC, SiriusXM Channel 90 and the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Radio Network.
Ty Gibbs, Driver of the No. 54 Monster Energy Toyota GR Supra
“Was a good weekend last week at Pocono, second in the Xfinity race and then getting my first Cup start. Was pretty cool, but now it’s time to focus on Indy. I do love the road courses and obviously Indy has all the history. So excited about it and I know we’ll have a strong Monster Energy Toyota GR Supra.”
Chris Gayle, Crew Chief of the No. 54 Monster Energy Toyota GR Supra
“Ty raced very clean last week and did a great job. Tough to finish second, but it was a solid drive and he showed a lot of maturity. Was cool to see him get his first Cup start too. Lot of effort by a lot of people here at JGR and at 23XI but he had a great debut. He loves road courses and hopefully we’ll be successful at Indy. We’ll bring him a good Monster Energy Toyota GR Supra.”
JGR PR
