Jesse Love and the No. 2 Whelen Chevrolet Team Earn Top-10 Finish at Phoenix Raceway En Route to Claiming Sunoco Rookie of the Year Honors
“Our No. 2 Whelen Chevrolet was fast tonight. The balance started tight, but crew chief Danny Stockman made great adjustments to our Camaro. The long run was our strong suit. We played strategy early in order to save two sets of tires for the end of the race and luckily, we got a chance to put them on at the end. Our pit crew was fast all night and picked up positions each stop. We restarted from the lead on the last restart and had a shot to win. The No. 98 got to my right rear, the No. 7 dove to my inside to push and then we lost a lot of time. I’m proud of our team’s effort this weekend. We showed speed, ran up front, and closed the season with another top-10. Thank you to everyone at Richard Childress Racing and ECR Engines, Whelen and all of our partners for a great season. We will be ready to go in 2025.”
-Jesse Love
Austin Hill and the No. 21 Bennett Transportation & Logistics Team Round out Championship Run with Strong Performance at Phoenix Raceway
“All in all, solid effort for everyone on this No. 21 Bennett Transportation and Logistics Team, Richard Childress Racing and ECR Engines. Our RCR Chevrolet was pretty good at the start of the race. We didn’t have a winning race car to start the race, but we were better than the other three. We were a little free in Stage 1 so we tightened up, and for whatever reason when we tightened up our Chevy started over-slipping on the front. On hindsight, maybe I should have asked for our Chevy to stay on the free side all day to avoid getting behind on adjustments. We pitted with the No. 7 team for sticker tires and drove up through the field. I knew we were running out of laps, but then I saw the No. 7 and the No. 00 fighting it out and I thought if they got to battling I would have a shot because we were running some decent lap times. When the caution flag came out, I knew we were going to be at a tire deficit, but we had to try something so we pitted for right-side scuffs. I got down into Turn 1 for the restart and I drove as deep as I could trying to protect from out back. I over-slipped the front tires and started sliding. I saw the No. 00 getting to my right-rear and I didn’t want that to happen so I slid up the track and then he got into the back of me. Coming off the corner, I was sideways and it allowed the No. 7 to get by both of us. There was a lot of hard racing out there tonight. I’m going to hold my head up high, no matter what, even though we didn’t win the race. It was fun being able to race in the Final Four. Congratulations to Justin Allgaier and everyone on the No. 7 team on winning the championship.”
-Austin Hill
RCR PR
