HOMESTEAD, Fla.: With their first career top-10 finish in the books in their most recent race at Martinsville (Va.) Speedway, CR7 Motorsports and NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series (NGOTS) rookie Codie Rohrbaugh head to Homestead-Miami (Fla.) Speedway for Friday night’s season-finale hopeful to earn back-to-back top-10 finishes in the Ford EcoBoost 200.
After missing the spring race at Martinsville, the Petersburg, West Virginia native stepped up to the plate for the NASCAR Hall of Fame 200 determined to learn from his setbacks earlier in the season.
Easily qualifying into the field with an 18th place starting position, Rohrbaugh stayed cool, calm and collected aboard his No. 9 Grant County Mulch Chevrolet and used the guidance of spotter Tim Fedewa and a fast truck dialed in by crew chief Doug George to vault to a 10th place finish career-best finish in just his 10th career NGOTS start.
“I can’t tell you what that top-10 finish did for us as a team,” said Rohrbaugh. “We certainly made some gains during the season, but it was nice to have a finish go along with all of that hard work. The credit goes to the guys on this CR7 Motorsports team who have worked their guts out to give me a competitive truck with each track we go to.
“With some momentum on our side, we want to keep the strong finishes rolling in the 23rd race of 2019 on Friday night.”
While the Mooresville, N.C.-based team had planned to partake in last year’s season finale, the team opted to focus on the 2019 season instead. Heading to the Sunshine State, Rohrbaugh is hoping that his previous experience on the intermediate tracks will pay dividends in Miami.
“I’ve never raced at Homestead, but I’ve watched the truck races there,” Rohrbaugh said. “It doesn’t seem to race like any mile and a half-track that we’ve raced on in 2019 but that’s part of the excitement going to the race track.
“Figuratively speaking the day is very short. Two quick practices, qualifying and then the race. It’s going to be another stacked field, so we need to make sure we have a good baseline setup that we can work with and then attack qualifying to get ourselves in a good spot.
“From there – it’s racing the race track and doing what we can to end the season on a high note and get ready for 2020.”
The final details for the team’s sophomore season in the NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series are still being hashed out, but at the very least, Rohrbaugh says his CR7 Motorsports will have a very similar schedule next year – if not adding a couple more races along the way.
“We’re going to be back next year and that’s the good thing,” sounded Rohrbaugh. “We’ve made a lot of gains, but there is still plenty of work to be done and the only way we’re going to get better is to keep racing and see where we fall. With a top-10 in our books, we can aim for a top-five and then eventually a win.
“It will be a busy off-season of getting our equipment in order and being ready to go for Daytona in February. But, before we focus on 2020, we’re going to Homestead to be competitive and have a little fun.”
CR7 Motorsports has 10 NGOTS starts to their credit with a career-best finish of 10th at Martinsville (Va.) Speedway (October 2019). An 11th place qualifying effort at Talladega (Ala.) Superspeedway (Oct. 2019) is the team’s best time trials effort to date.
In 20 career ARCA starts, Rohrbaugh has a best finish of seventh twice at Pocono (Pa.) Raceway (July 2018 and Daytona (Fla.) International Speedway (February 2019). He has qualified a career-best fourth on four different occasions most recently at Kansas Speedway (Oct. 2018).
Marketing partnership(s) opportunities are available for the No. 7 Grant County Mulch Chevrolet and No. 9 Grant County Mulch Chevrolet for the 2020 ARCA Menards Series and NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series seasons and beyond. Interested inquiries are encouraged to contact at tonya@gcmulch.com or 304.257.8783.
Following Homestead, CR7 Motorsports plans to return to the Gander Truck Series scene for the 2020 season-opener at Daytona (Fla.) International Speedway on Fri., Feb. 14, 2020.
The Ford EcoBoost 200 (134 laps | 201 miles) is the 23rd of 23 races on the 2019 NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series schedule. Practice begins on Fri., Nov. 15 from 9:05 a.m. – 9:55 a.m. A final practice has been etched in from 10:35 a.m. – 11:25 a.m. Qualifying is set for later in the day beginning at 4:35 p.m. The 32-truck field will take the green flag shortly after 8:00 p.m. with live coverage on FOX Sports 1 (FS1), the Motor Racing Network (Radio) and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio (Satellite Radio, Channel 90). All times are local (Eastern).
