BRANDON JONES WINS IN GREEN-WHITE-CHECKERED THRILLER AT CHICAGOLAND
Two Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota GR Supra’s Finish Inside Top-Five in Return to 1.5-mile Oval
JOLIET, Ill. (July 4, 2026) – Brandon Jones used a strong green-white-checkered restart to make a thrilling last-lap pass on Chase Elliott and win Saturday night’s rain-delayed NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series race at Chicagoland Speedway.
The victory was Jones’ first of the season and the eighth win of his career, coming in NASCAR’s return to the 1.5-mile oval in Joliet after a seven-year absence. It was also a strong night for Team Toyota, with Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota GR Supras claiming three of the top-seven finishing positions. Brent Crews finished fourth, while Taylor Gray, who led a total of 55 laps, came home seventh.
TOYOTA RACING Post-Race Recap
NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series (NOAPS)
Chicagoland Speedway
Race 20 of 33 – 300 miles, 200 laps
TOYOTA FINISHING POSITIONS
1st, BRANDON JONES
2nd, Chase Elliott*
3rd, Jesse Love*
4th, BRENT CREWS
5th, Austin Hill*
7th, TAYLOR GRAY
15th, HARRISON BURTON
17th, DEAN THOMPSON
29th, WILLIAM SAWALICH
*non-Toyota driver
TOYOTA QUOTES
BRANDON JONES, No. 20 Menards/MD Building Products Toyota GR Supra, Joe Gibbs Racing
Finishing Position: 1st
How did you muscle through and hold off Chase Elliott on that final restart?
“I had to earn that one. I haven’t had an exciting one like that in a long time. Thank you guys for sticking this out in the rain. MD Building supplies and Menard’s and Toyota, I’m so happy to get them back in victory lane. It’s been so up and down year. We’ve had some success early on and we’ve been in a little bit of a rut the last couple of weeks, so it’s nice to do what we did today, we had to earn that one.”
What does it mean to win in the return to Chicagoland, but also hold off a Cup Series Champion?
“Think it says a lot about how resilient we are and how hard we are working at this. Chase (Elliott) made it really difficult on me. He’s one of the best in the sport so I know it was going to be difficult. We were all on old tires, that was a blast to slide around and duel it out like that. I knew had made the right adjustments there at the end and you can tell people were getting tighter tonight with the temperature falling down and the track was migrating. Awesome racetrack, you guys know I love these style of tracks, they fit me so well, lets get on a roll and get some more here before the Chase starts.”
BRENT CREWS, No. 19 YoungLife Toyota GR Supra, Joe Gibbs Racing
Finishing Position: 4th
Can you tell us what happened with the contact with William Sawalich?
“I take full accountability for sure. Squeezing off the bottom off of (turn) 2 and he’s coming off the top and I was just trying to pack air on his left rear and get him free and I got him free like I was trying to and when he got free he checked up I couldn’t get checked up fast enough. These aero spots when you are going 170 mph you can barely, barely tap somebody and they go around. I take full accountability, I would hate to do that to anybody, especially to a teammate. I hate that has to be my learning experience, but I definitely learned my limit there and I hate that was on my teammate.”
What do you take away from coming here to another new racetrack for you and bringing home a top five finish?
“We had a very difficult day. We were really, really good in practice, I thought we were one of the best cars and went out there for the first run and we were good there for the first three laps and then we were just extremely tight and we came in and the right front tire was just destroyed. Don’t know how it really corded there and just had a bad right front tire there. We made some adjustments going into the second run thinking it was something on our end but then we fought balance on the total opposite end on the next stage and then the last break there we were really good. I hate that’s what we had to go through, but I felt like the last 20 laps we were incredible, I just wish we had found out a little bit sooner.”
About Toyota
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