While Kyle Busch was busy celebrating his fifth 2019 NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series victory in five starts, Brennan Poole emerged as the surprising runner-up.
A week ago, Poole and the On Point Motorsports team didn’t even show up to the track do to sponsorship issues. One week later, they nearly pulled off the ultimate Cinderella Story win.
For Poole, it’s been a long road to this top finish.
The 28-year old driver was once a promising prospect with ambitions of going big-time NASCAR Cup Series raving with Chip Ganassi Racing.
After 36 top-10 finishes through 83 starts in the NASCAR Xfinity Series for CGR, Poole’s sponsor — D.C. Solar — bailed and opted to sponsor Kyle Larson and Ross Chastain instead of him.
It was a gut-punch, and it led to ugly court proceedings about whether or not CGR conspired to cut Poole out of the D.C. Solar deal.
For the 2018 season, Poole was left searching and perhaps the long anxious wait allowed Poole to channel that emerging talent that was once heralded.
After signing with the upstart On Point Motorsports team this offseason, Poole has done nothing but impress. He now has two top-10 finishes with the organization through seven starts and he sits 13th in the Series championship standings despite missing a race.
This latest incredible effort came after the sway bar broke on Poole’s truck in the opening laps of the event.
“It was a freaking battle.” Poole said. “The sway bar broke before the end of the first stage on the left front, so the frontend was really moving around a lot and the truck was unsettled and it really hurt me with lateral grip, so I was struggling when I got beside a truck so I had to run the top. I just found something there towards the end of the race that helped me on the restarts and (Steven) “Bones” (Lane), my crew chief, made good adjustments and man I just ripped the top.”
If Poole can keep chipping away, the No. 30 team may very well find themselves in victory lane before the season is over.
