Ty Gibbs (second) and Brandon Jones (seventh) finished in the top-10 in Saturday afternoon’s NASCAR Xfinity Series race at the Roval road course at Charlotte Motor Speedway. Gibbs was leading in the closing laps until two late-race restarts in overtime allowed race-winner, AJ Allmendinger to pass him after making contact with the outside wall. Jones was able to pickup a stage win and joined Gibbs in advancing to the Round of 8 in the NASCAR Playoffs.
Toyota Racing Post-Race Recap
NASCAR Xfinity Series
Charlotte Motor Speedway Road Course
Race 29 of 33 – 155.44 miles, 67 laps
TOYOTA FINISHING POSITIONS
1st, AJ Allmendinger*
2nd, TY GIBBS
3rd, Noah Gragson*
4th, JAMES DAVISON
5th, Justin Allgaier*
7th, BRANDON JONES
15th, DANIIL KVYAT
19th, JJ YELEY
23rd, BRAD PEREZ
28th, TIMMY HILL
*non-Toyota driver
TOYOTA QUOTES
TY GIBBS, No. 54 Monster Energy Toyota GR Supra, Joe Gibbs Racing
Finishing Position: 2nd
What did you need to get to AJ Allmendinger in the closing laps?
“We had a very fast Monster Energy GR Supra. We got in the wall a little bit there on both of the restarts and never could get back to the 16 (AJ Allmendinger). We had great speed. I just want to thank my team. I had a great time in the race today and happy that we’re moving onto the round of eight.”
BRANDON JONES, No. 19 Menards/Fisher Toyota GR Supra, Joe Gibbs Racing
Finishing Position: 7th
How do you feel about making it into the next round by only two points? How was your race overall today to be able to execute what you and your team needed to do in order to transfer?
“It was one of those days where everyone just did their job. I think we had a goal in mind today. We always want to come in and win these races, but our goal today was to come in and move onto the next round. Whatever we had to do to do that was what we decided on. Knew we needed some stage points. That first one threw me for a loop, didn’t start off as good as I wanted it to for this race. Jeff (Meendering, crew chief) made a really good call on the first stop to do an adjustment and got some really good adjustments in there and once we got track position, we were fast enough to maintain it. It was just that we weren’t really fast enough to drive up to that point. So we did a really good job flipping that stage and getting the stage win. Then at the end, they did as really, really good job of letting me know where everyone was points-wise. That’s what I told them what I wanted to hear all day so I knew how hard I needed to push for that next position or if I can ride in that area and not have to push. There was no reason to go for that next spot if you didn’t have to and end up taking yourself out over something crazy. We were just really solid. We didn’t spin out, didn’t have any lockups. Everyone did their job on pit road. That’s really what we need to do these next couple of rounds to get to Phoenix.”
Toyota Racing PR