Taylor Gray Posts sixth-place finish as he stays above the playoff cutline
KANSAS CITY, Kan. (September 27, 2025) – Polesitter Brandon Jones dominated with a strong long-run car to earn his second Xfinity Series win of the season Saturday afternoon at Kansas Speedway.
The victory marked Jones’ first career win from the pole, as the driver of the No. 20 Toyota GR Supra led six times for a total of 54 laps to secure his third career win at the 1.5-mile Kansas oval. The win was also his seventh career Xfinity Series victory and also qualified him for the Round of 8 in the 2025 playoffs.
In addition to Jones’ win, it was also a strong showing for a trio of Toyota GR Supras who finished inside the top-11, with Gray (sixth), William Sawalich (ninth), and Dean Thompson (11th). Gray also heads to next weekends cutoff race 16 points above the top eight cutline.
Toyota GAZOO Racing Post-Race Recap
NASCAR Xfinity Series (NXS)
Kansas Speedway
Race 28 of 33 – 300 miles, 200 laps
TOYOTA FINISHING POSITIONS
1st, BRANDON JONES
2nd, Connor Zilisch*
3rd, Austin Hill*
4th, Sammy Smith*
5th, Sheldon Creed*
6th, TAYLOR GRAY
10th, DEAN THOMPSON
11th, WILLIAM SAWALICH
22nd, PATRICK STAROPOLI
37th, JUSTIN BOSIGNORE
*non-Toyota driver
TOYOTA QUOTES
BRANDON JONES, No. 19 Menards/Spectracide Toyota GR Supra, Joe Gibbs Racing
Finishing Position: 1st
How good does it feel good to put the whole day together and get the win?
“It’s huge to win the final stage, would have liked to have won the first two stages but I’m not going to get greedy. No mistakes, the entire day was so well executed. In my career that was by far my best executed race. I’m so proud of these guys, we work so hard the entire week to get her and put races like this together. I was so happy it went green. I know for the fans they want to see action, but I was just praying for long runs was so good there. It was as fast as Xfinity Mobile all day. We had people here from Spectracide, Hot Shots, Rejuvenate, and Menards this weekend. It’s always a blast to win and move onto the next round.”
How big was it to win here with some good tracks like Vegas coming up with another intermediate track?
“We’ve always been a contender at Vegas, we just haven’t been able to get it done there yet. We’ve always been fast at Vegas but I feel like the momentum we have from this weekend we are peaking at the right time with these racecars.”
What are your emotions for your third career win at Kansas?
“I’ve got so much confidence in this racetrack, I just love coming to this place. We contend every time we come here, Joe Gibbs Racing is always extremely fast at these places and Toyota shows up with a ton of speed in thye entire camp. We’ve got guys fast in the Cup race as well. It’s just a good weekend overall for us at Toyota and Joe Gibbs Racing. I’m sure pumped about this one, this is huge. It’s the momentum we really need at the right time right now going into the Round of 8. I’m happy going into the Roval next week, I think it’s going to be a fun race, but I’m happy I can go and have some fun with it and not be too stressed or overly worried about the points situation.”
You were racing the racetrack, how much did this play into getting the win?
“This tire was a lot of fun this weekend and this race was a lot of fun. It was kind of a unique line we had to run here today. It really went to that high line and then run it down to the middle of the racetrack it was really slick and super hard to manage the grip level of our GR Supra today. That part of it was a blast from the driver side of it having to drive around tire rubber and handling issues all day and I think we made the perfect call to get the tires when we did and then I was happy this race went green like it did for it because that was the strength of our racecar all weekend long, just how good it was on the long runs. We could hang with the guys on restarts and shorter runs, but it was more of a challenge, but we were just so consistent over the long run versus the JR Motorsports cars.”
TAYLOR GRAY, No. 54 Operation 300 Toyota GR Supra, Joe Gibbs Racing
Finishing Position: 6th
Tell us about your day
“I thought we had an alright day. We worked on our car all day, felt like we made our Operation 300 Toyota GR Supra better. Still didn’t quite get where we wanted to be towards the end balance wise. Overall, a good points day and we’ll move onto the Roval.”
JUSTIN BONSIGNORE, No. 19 M3 Technology Toyota GR Supra, Joe Gibbs Racing
Finishing Position: 37th
What happened there with contact between you and the 48 (Nick Sanchez)
“He just wasn’t clear off of (turn) 2. I don’t know if he got free there and corrected up into me, I only saw it one time so it was hard to tell. Unfortunate, we were running in the top-12 all day and just learning. It’s so hard to come in and out of here every 10 weeks and do this. The car was really good, we had a good Toyota GR Supra today, want to also thank M3 Technology. Would have liked to have seen the checkered flag, we deserved to finish in the top-10. On to Martinsville and we’ll see what we can do there.”
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