John Wes Townley Earns 17th Place Finish at Bristol

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John Wes Townley made his return to the NASCAR Nationwide Series (NNS) this past weekend driving the Venturini Motorsports No.25 Zaxby’s Toyota during the Jeff Foxworthy’s Grit Chips 300 at Bristol Motor Speedway.

Arriving with much anticipation John Wes was eager to get back behind the wheel of his NNS car. After a strong first practice session Friday morning John Wes found himself 13th on the speed charts with a 15.78 second lap time. The team continued to work on the car set-up and prepared for Saturday’s main eventAfter fighting a tight race car and qualifying 34th (16.149) the Venturini crew was confident based on John Wes’s practice speeds the car would improve once the race began.

“We didn’t get the qualifying position we were expecting but we never lost confidence knowing what we had during Friday’s practice sessions,” said crew chief, Dan Deeringhoff.

Once the race began, John Wes showed patience as he began to slowly improve his track position climbing up to the 23rd position. After a series of pit stops and changes to the No.25 Zaxby’s car midway through the 300-lap event John Wes settled in and focused on the second half of the race.

Inside 100-laps to go in the race, Townley broke into the top-20. Strong pit stops and valuable track position allowed Townley to creep into the 17th position where he ultimately finished.

“Obviously I wasn’t thrilled with my starting position but knew we were really good during race runs. All-in-all it was a great day and I was extremely happy with the team’s weekend performance. I feel we learned a lot and will improve the next time we hit the track,” stated Townley.

After starting 34th and finishing 17th, Townley gained the most positions of any driver during the event. In 44 career NNS starts, John Wes’s best finish (15th) came at Las Vegas in 2010 and Talladega in 2012.

Townley’s next NNS event with Venturini Motorsports will come on May 4th at Talladega Superspeedway. In the meantime, he’ll resume his NASCAR Camping World Truck Series schedule at Martinsville on April 6th and will be back with Venturini in the ARCA car at Salem Speedway on April 28th.

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