Corey Heim had the best truck in Friday’s NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series Mission 176 at Watkins Glen International, but it took the 23-year-old driver battling back from some self-inflicted adversity to claim his sixth win of the season.
Post-Race Resources:
Race Results: Mission 176 at The Glen
Updated Point Standings: Driver | Owner | Rookie | Manufacturer
“Yeah, just never give up,” Heim said after his 17th career NASCAR Truck Series win. “I got behind on that last Stage. I was scratching and clawing trying to get back through the field. I had my brakes pretty much go out completely on me on that long green flag run. I was beating them up trying to get through the field. Blew the bus stop, I made a lot of mistakes myself. I feel like we’ve had a lot of them get away from us this year by cautions or whatever else — failures, or parts, whatever. But finally had one go our way.”
Heim found himself mired back in the field heading into the final Stage of the race due to varying pit strategies, and the driver blew through the bus stop near the end of the race, which seemingly ended his bid to pull off the race win. Then, a rash of late-race cautions allowed the driver to climb back into the mix.
After a wild restart on Lap 64, which resulted in Tanner Gray crashing off of the front bumper of Ty Majeski’s No. 98 truck, Heim found himself restarting in the fourth position on Lap 69.
When Andres Perez de Lara and William Sawalich made contact while battling for the runner-up spot into the bus stop after the restart, Heim was able to skirt by to move into the second position behind NASCAR Cup Series regular Christopher Bell, who was driving the No. 52 Halmar Friesen Racing Toyota in place of the injured Stewart Friesen.
A caution promptly after due to a crash involving Ben Rhodes, who lost the left rear wheel on his No. 99 Ford F-150, sent the race into overtime.
Heim would out-duel Bell for the race lead on the initial Overtime attempt, but Perez de Lara would crash on Lap 73, which sent the race into Double-Overtime.
It was under this caution that Bell’s truck started sputtering out of fuel. Bell would have to relinquish the lead to take additional fuel, which handed the runner-up spot to Tyler Ankrum.
However, another crash, this time involving Grant Enfinger, Connor Mosack, Majeski, and Jake Garcia on Lap 77, would send the race into triple-Overtime, and it was under this caution that Ankrum had to pit for additional fuel.
This would allow Daniel Hemric to move alongside Heim on the final restart of the race, and over the last couple of laps of the race, Hemric, who was on much fresher tires, pushed Heim to the limit as he got up alongside of him a few times. But Heim was able to fend off every challenge and won the race by a margin of 0.202 seconds over Hemric.
While he gave Heim just about everything he could handle in the closing laps, Hemric was disappointed as he felt he gave the win away.
“Yeah, he did a really good job, and I really didn’t to be honest with you having that much of a tire advantage,” Hemric anguished. “Still thought we were going to be in the mix, there, and then I shallowed my entry too much when I got up beside of him there off of [Turn] 1 on the white flag lap. Got into the door of him, about lost it there, and didn’t think I’d have a chance to get back to him, and then, next thing you know, I did.
“And then I had a run on him into [Turn] 6 and drove in with [an] open mind and when he missed and it allowed me to get to the left of him, and I thought I was going to have a shot. I don’t know, I just felt like he had such a bad angle going into [Turn 7] and I just thought I’d be able to turn under him with the tire advantage. And I was completely blown away at the amount of potential he still had.”
Hemric, who scored his first-career NASCAR Truck Series win earlier this season at Martinsville Speedway, will be thinking about this missed opportunity all week long.
“Yeah, I’m going to replay that last couple [of laps] for a while. I’ve got what — six days until the next race? This one will be on my mind until then, probably,” Hemric admitted.
Rookie of the Year contender Gio Ruggiero finished the race in third, and he was followed across the finish line by Christopher Bell, and Tyler Ankrum inside of the top-five.
Sammy Smith, Ty Majeski, Connor Zilisch, Matt Mills, and Layne Riggs rounded out the top-10 finishers.
With one race left in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series regular season, six drivers have secured their place in the Playoffs. Heim, who has six wins, Layne Riggs (two wins), Chandler Smith (two), Tyler Ankrum (one), Daniel Hemric (one), and Rajah Caruth (one).
The four additional drivers, currently above the cutline by way of points include Grant Enfinger, who is 91 points above the cutline, defending series champion Ty Majeski, who is 84 points to the good, Kaden Honeycutt, who is 65 points above the cutline, and Jake Garcia, who is 11 points up.
Ben Rhodes, who won Stage 2 of Friday’s race, sits 11 points outside of the cutline, and he is followed in the standings by Gio Ruggiero (-21 points), Tanner Gray (-69), and Connot Mosack (-103).
Next up for the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series is the eero 250 at Richmond Raceway, which will take place on Friday, August 15. That race will be televised on FS1, and the broadcast coverage will kick off at 7:30 PM ET. The NASCAR Racing Network and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio will provide the radio broadcast of the regular-season finale event.
