FORT WORTH, Texas – On the heels of a successful partial season in the ARCA Racing Series presented by Menards which included four top-10 finishes, Codie Rohrbaugh and his Grant County Mulch Racing (GCMR) team turn their concentration towards the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series (NCWTS) and Friday night’s JAG Metals 350.
Rohrbaugh and crew chief Mark Huff head to the Lone Star State hoping to improve on their inaugural Truck Series debut at Bristol (Tenn.) Motor Speedway in Aug., when the Petersburg, West Virginia native successfully qualified on-time in 25th and raced to a competitive 16th place finish.
With momentum on their side, Rohrbaugh and his family-owned team have high hopes for his intermediate track Truck Series debut.
“Ever since the checkered flag at Kansas, it’s been game on towards Texas this weekend,” said Rohrbaugh. “For our debut at Bristol, I think we accomplished all the goals we wanted to. But for Texas, we’ve kinda raised the bar a notch.
“No doubt Friday’s race is going to be a learning experience for me, but it’s practice I need to make the best us better for the long haul. As long as we’re continuing to make gains, progressing forward and finishing the race, the weekend will be considered a success.”
For the first time this season, the Grant County Mulch Racing team will run a Ford.
Recently acquiring a truck from ARCA powerhouse Chad Bryant Racing, Rohrbaugh says his team has put a lot of effort into his No. 9 Grant County Mulch Ford to prepare it for the penultimate mile-and-a-half race of the year.
“The truck we obtained from Chad Bryant Racing is a nice piece,” added Rohrbaugh. “We’ve put a lot of time and effort into it and it has a new body from one of the top teams in the Truck Series, so that has us optimistic that we can unload pretty decent and be contenders for a top-10 finish on Friday night.”
The 24-year-old Rohrbaugh is also using Friday night’s for experience as he continues to transition to a more predominant role in the Truck Series. The Mooresville, N.C.-based team will also compete in the season-finale at Homestead-Miami (Fla.) Speedway on Nov. 16.
“We’re excited about the growth of our team,” Rohrbaugh sounded. “The experience from Texas and Homestead will help our program for 2019. We haven’t determined how many races exactly we’re going to run – but we’re happy about the direction that we’re going and look forward to announcing more in the future.”
In 18 career ARCA starts, Rohrbaugh has a best finish of seventh at Pocono (Pa.) Raceway (July 2018). He has qualified a career-best fourth on four different occasions including his most recent ARCA race at Kansas Speedway (Oct. 2018).
Marketing partnership opportunities are available for the No. 7 Grant County Mulch Chevrolet and No. 9 Grant County Mulch Ford for the 2019 ARCA Racing Series and NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series seasons and beyond. Interested inquiries are encouraged to contact tonya@gcmulch.com.
The JAG Metals 350 (147 laps | 220.5 miles) is the 21st of 23 races on the 2018 NASCAR Camping World Truck schedule. Practice begins on Thurs. Nov. 1 from 3:05 p.m. – 3:55 p.m., while final practice is set for 5:05 p.m. – 5:55 p.m. Qualifying is set for race day, Fri., Nov. 2 beginning at 3:10 p.m. The 32-truck field will take the green flag shortly after 7:30 p.m. with live coverage on FS1, the Motor Racing Network (Radio) and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio (Satellite Radio, Channel 90). All times are local (Central).
