Trevor Bayne, driver of the No. 6 Performance Plus Motor Oil Ford Fusion, heads into this weekend’s Monster Energy Cup Series (MENCS) regular season finale at Richmond Raceway knowing that a win will get the Knoxville, Tenn. native into the opening round of the Playoffs next weekend in Chicago.
“We know what we have to do this weekend,” said Bayne. “We know the position we are in with our Performance Plus Motor Oil Ford and that we need to win on Saturday. I’m extremely confident that we will unload fast once again this weekend and that (crew chief) Matt (Puccia) will call another great strategy on Saturday night that will put us in position for the win.”
Bayne, who has scored a top-10 finish in two of the last three races, has an average finish of 11th in the four previous short track races in 2017, recording a best finish of seventh at Bristol Motor Speedway on Aug. 19. Overall, the 2011 Daytona 500 Champion has made 18 starts in the MENCS on short tracks and has earned a best finish of fifth in the spring 2016 event at Bristol.
“Our whole team is excited about returning to Richmond,” added Bayne. “We ran well here in the spring and we have a lot of momentum on our side with our short track program after our top-10 finish in Bristol. Hopefully we can avoid any potential craziness that happens on Saturday night and be there at the end and get the win to get into the Playoffs.”
The MENCS event at Richmond Raceway is scheduled to begin live on Saturday, Sept. 9 at 7:30 p.m. EST on NBCSN, MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio Channel 90.
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