This Week in Motorsports: July 13-19, 2020
· NCS: Bristol Motor Speedway (Bristol, Tennessee) – July 15
· NCS/NXS/NGROTS: Texas Motor Speedway (Fort Worth, Texas) – July 18-19
· ARCA: Iowa Speedway (Newton, Iowa) – July 18
PLANO, Texas (July 15, 2020) – NASCAR’s annual All-Star Race kicks off the weekend before heading to Texas, while the ARCA Menards Series makes their annual stop at Iowa Speedway.
NASCAR National Series – NCS | NXS | NGROTS
All-Star Ready… Four Toyota drivers are locked into Wednesday night’s All-Star Race, which was moved to Bristol Motor Speedway for the first time. Kyle Busch, Denny Hamlin, Erik Jones and Martin Truex Jr. each earned a spot on the strength of their NASCAR Cup Series (NCS) race wins last year. Christopher Bell and Daniel Suárez look to qualify for the main race through the Open. Hamlin (2015) and Busch (2017) have each won the prestigious event while five Toyota drivers have raced their way through after winning the Open, including Truex (2010) and Suárez (2017).
Texas Strong… Busch and Hamlin have each driven their Toyota Camrys to victory lane at Texas Motor Speedway in the last two years. In April 2018, Busch scored his third Texas trophy after leading 116 laps. Hamlin also added his third Texas triumph last season, just down the highway from Toyota’s North American headquarters.
Jones Streaking… Jones has scored five consecutive top 10 finishes at Texas Motor Speedway, dating back to the fall of his rookie NCS season in November 2017. Those stats include three fourth-place finishes in 2018 and 2019.
Riding High After Career-Best… Riley Herbst tied his career-best NASCAR Xfinity Series (NXS) result with a second-place finish last week at Kentucky Speedway. A steady string of eight top-10 results this year has boosted Herbst inside the top 10 in the point standings. Herbst carries momentum to his first start at Texas Motor Speedway.
Hill Continues to Lead… After a fifth-place finish in the rain-shortened NASCAR Gander RV & Outdoors Truck Series (NGROTS) event at Kentucky Speedway, Austin Hill extended his streak to seven consecutive top 10 finishes since the beginning the 2020 season, after also winning last year’s season finale. Hill has a 46-point lead in the overall driver standings.
Home of the Tundra… Texas is home to the Tundra, with over 200,000 built yearly at Toyota Motor Manufacturing, Texas (TMMTX) in San Antonio. Texas has also been the site of significant Tundra success as Toyota drivers have driven to more Texas wins than any other NASCAR track with 19 NGROTS trophies, including eight of the last 12 NGROTS events at the Fort Worth, Texas-based facility. Toyota has six drivers in the field looking to add to that success – points leader Hill, series win leader Busch, veteran Stewart Friesen and rookie contenders Christian Eckes, Derek Kraus and Raphael Lessard.
NASCAR Regional Series – ARCA
A Year and Counting… Ty Gibbs added another ARCA Menards Series win last weekend at Kentucky Speedway – his second national ARCA win this season and the 14th consecutive ARCA victory for Toyota, which extends the series record. Toyota has now won every national ARCA event for over a full calendar year – a streak Chandler Smith began with a victory at Elko Speedway on July 13, 2019.
Running for Two Championships… This weekend’s event at Iowa Speedway counts for the national ARCA Menards Series championship as well as the Sioux Chief Showdown Series. The 20-event ARCA championship is currently led by Michael Self with a 22-point advantage over teammate Drew Dollar. Self and Dollar’s Venturini Motorsports teammate Chandler Smith is the leader of the Sioux Chief Showdown after victories in the first two events on the schedule at Phoenix Raceway in March and Lucas Oil Raceway in Indianapolis in July.
Stay Connected
@ToyotaRacing.com @ToyotaRacing
facebook.com/ToyotaRacing Camera With Flash on Apple iOS 11.3 ToyotaRacingMedia.com
# # #
About Toyota
Toyota (NYSE:TM) has been a part of the cultural fabric in the U.S. and North America for more than 60 years, and is committed to advancing sustainable, next-generation mobility through our Toyota and Lexus brands. During that time, Toyota has created a tremendous value chain as our teams have contributed to world-class design, engineering, and assembly of more than 40 million cars and trucks in North America, where we have 14 manufacturing plants, 15 including our joint venture in Alabama (10 in the U.S.), and directly employ more than 47,000 people (over 36,000 in the U.S.). Our 1,800 North American dealerships (nearly 1,500 in the U.S.) sold nearly 2.8 million cars and trucks (nearly 2.4 million in the U.S.) in 2019.
Through the Start Your Impossible campaign, Toyota highlights the way it partners with community, civic, academic and governmental organizations to address our society’s most pressing mobility challenges. We believe that when people are free to move, anything is possible. For more information about Toyota, visit www.toyotanewsroom.com.
