Ray Ciccarelli Quietly Makes Noise With First-Career Top-10 at Michigan

It’s been a solid part-time 2019 campaign for Maryland’s Ray Ciccarelli. The underfunded No. 49 truck, when it has made the field has had decent speed all season, and had recorded a couple of top-20 finishes heading into Saturday’s Corrigan Oil 200 at Michigan International Speedway.

However, Ciccarelli well outperformed his best efforts of the year as he came home an eye-opening ninth at one of the toughest type of tracks for underfunded organizations — high speed, aerodynamic 2-mile ovals.

Ciccarelli started the day with an owner’s point provisional in the 30th-position in the 32-truck field.

However, as the race unfolded, Ciccarelli was able to keep his nose clean and he skillfully avoided a carnage filled restart with just a few laps to go to put himself in position for a top finish.

Through six starts in 2019, Ciccarelli now has an average finish of 20.3. Not too shabby at all for a little organization looking to make a lot happen on not much of a budget.