Rookie contender Taylor Gray falls just one point short of advancing to the Round of 8
CONCORD, N.C. (October 4, 2025) – Kaz Grala led Toyota with a fourth-place finish in the NASCAR Xfinity Series race at Charlotte Motor Speedway’s ROVAL course on Saturday evening. Grala matched his career-best Xfinity Series finish in just his third start this season, while for Sam Hunt Racing it was the team’s best result of the year.
Taylor Gray looked headed to the Round of 8 in his rookie season before a caution led to a late-race overtime restart. Through the last two lap battle, Gray slipped to 13th – missing the Round of 8 by a single point.
Toyota will be represented in the next round of the Playoffs by Kansas winner Brandon Jones, who finished 18th today.
Toyota GAZOO Racing Post-Race Recap
NASCAR Xfinity Series (NXS)
Charlotte Motor Speedway ROVAL
Race 29 of 33 – 152.76 miles, 67 laps
TOYOTA FINISHING POSITIONS
1st, Connor Zilisch*
2nd, Austin Green*
3rd, Sammy Smithr*
4th, KAZ GRALA
5th, Connor Mosack*
7th, WILLIAM SAWALICH
13th, TAYLOR GRAY
14th, ARIC ALMIROLA
18th, BRANDON JONES
25th, SAGE KARAM
35th, DEAN THOMPSON
*non-Toyota driver
TOYOTA QUOTES
KAZ GRALA, No. 24 Overplay Games Toyota GR Supra, Sam Hunt Racing
Finishing Position: 4th
Solid top-five in your final scheduled run of the year. How was your race?
“It was eventful. It was. The scorecard is going to show started ninth, finished fourth – that sounds pretty simple, but that is not what it was. We had to cycle to the back after the first pit stop with an uncontrolled tire, and man, I saw so many cars out my windshield, I thought we were never getting back, but we just kept our head down and stayed diligent. We made small tweaks to the car to get it better and better, and by the end of the night I think our GR Supra was handling as well as it had been all day. We had good speed in it, and we found ourselves with proper track position, and were able to capitalize on the cycle at the end. Really proud of this Sam Hunt Racing team, I love everyone over here – every time I get a chance to come out here and have some fun with them on a Saturday is a great, great weekend. Huge thank you to Overplay Games, Sam Hunt Racing, Toyota for giving me the opportunity and hopefully there is more to come down the road.”
TAYLOR GRAY, No. 54 Operation 300 Toyota GR Supra, Joe Gibbs Racing
Finishing Position: 13th
What emotions are going through your head right now?
“Just obviously bummed out. We don’t get to go racing for a championship at the end of the year. Just weren’t good enough. We weren’t good enough today. We didn’t have a good Bristol, and we shouldn’t have to even be in this spot. We are though, and we are going to take our loss, and move on to the next four and try to win us a couple of races.”
BRANDON JONES, No. 20 Menards Toyota GR Supra, Joe Gibbs Racing
Finishing Position: 18th
Not the night you were looking for tonight, but what are you looking forward to in the Round of 8?
“You know it would be nice to go ahead and knock it out at Las Vegas because it’s a good group of tracks, but it’s also a couple tracks in there with Talladega and Martinsville that it’s kind of in the fate of other people‘s hands at times. You can have a pretty much perfect day and just be taken out by somebody, so it’s just a race that you really don’t want to have to rely on, so if we can go ahead and do it early would be awesome but I’ve almost I’m almost done at Martinsville a few times. I’ve been really close, so it’s definitely not out of the equation.”
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