CHANDLER SMITH DRIVES TO TOP-10 FINISH IN BRISTOL
The 18-year-old Smith earns first top-10 finish of the season
BRISTOL, Tennessee (September 17, 2020) – Chandler Smith (sixth) led Toyota at the UNOH 200 at Bristol Motor Speedway on Thursday evening. Toyota Playoff drivers Christian Eckes and Austin Hill battled adversity all night. Eckes earned stage points in both stages and finished the race in the 13th, while Hill made contact with the wall on lap two and battled damage all night. The Truck Series regular season champion drove to a 26th-place finish.
Toyota Racing Post-Race Recap
NASCAR Gander RV & Outdoors Truck Series
Bristol Motor Speedway
Race 17 of 23 – 200 Laps, 106.6 Miles
TOYOTA FINISHING POSITIONS
1st, Sam Mayer*
2nd, Brett Moffitt*
3rd, Tanner Gray*
4th, Parker Kligerman*
5th, Trevor Bayne*
6th, CHANDLER SMITH
13th, CHRISTIAN ECKES
16th, DEREK KRAUS
19th, RAPHAEL LESSARD
23rd, CLAY GREENFIELD
25th, DANNY BOHN
26th, AUSTIN HILL
27th, JOSH BILICKI
33rd, STEWART FRIESEN
36th, JOSH REAUME
*non-Toyota driver
TOYOTA QUOTES
CHRISTIAN ECKES, No. 18 Safelite Auto Glass Toyota Tundra, Kyle Busch Motorsports
Finishing Position: 13th
Solid stage points, but not the finish you wanted. How was your race as a whole tonight?
“We tried hard. We just didn’t make it happen I guess. Had an okay Safelite Tundra at times, just fought track position all night and really wasn’t good enough to pass. I’m ready for Vegas. Thankfully, we don’t have to come to Bristol next week.”
You ran really strong at Las Vegas in the spring. What is your focus for that race?
“Just building on our last race. We ran really well there. Of course, we got in a crash, but I thought we had a Tundra to at least run second to Kyle (Busch), if not, win. We will try to hit it hard this week and try to figure it out, because we definitely missed it this week. On to the next one.” .”
AUSTIN HILL, No. 16 United Rentals Toyota Tundra, Hattori Racing Enterprises
Finishing Position: 26th
Obviously a disappointing race filled with issues from the early laps, but how do you and your team rebound and head to Vegas for next week’s race?
“I think we could have run in the top-10 tonight with our United Rentals Toyota Tundra, but we had a brake issue all race long. We’re not sure if it was from the damage early in the race or if we had another issue. We’ll go back and evaluate what happened and be ready to try to get a win at Las Vegas. We have a good history at Vegas so I’m ready to get there and see if we can get to victory lane.”
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