Toyota NASCAR Dover Advance
Week of May 29 – June 4, 2017
NEW LEADER UP FRONT: Camry driver Martin Truex Jr. led a race-high 233 laps (of 400) to finish third at Charlotte Motor Speedway last weekend and jump to first place in the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series (MENCS) point standings. With two victories and six stage wins through 12 races, Truex has 491 points to second-place Kyle Larson’s 486. Camry driver Kyle Busch finished second in the 600-miler and won the race’s opening segment, while Truex won the second stage. Camry driver Denny Hamlin, who finished fifth, won the third-of- four, 100-lap segments of NASCAR’s longest race, the Coca-Cola 600. Toyota’s Matt Kenseth finished fourth, while rookie Camry driver Erik Jones was seventh, his career-best Cup result.
TOYOTA DEFENSE AT DOVER: As NASCAR moves to Delaware’s Dover International Speedway this weekend, Toyota drivers are the defending race winners in all three NASCAR national series at the track with five Dover NASCAR wins last year. In the MENCS, Camry drivers Kenseth and Truex swept the races at Dover one year ago, while Cup rookies Jones and Suárez swept the NASCAR XFINITY Series (NXS) races at Dover in 2016. In the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series (NCWTS), Tundra driver Matt Crafton won at Dover last May, giving Toyota drivers victories in eight-of- the-last nine Truck Series races at the one-mile concrete oval. In total, Toyota drivers have 22 victories at Dover (four MENCS, 10 NXS and eight NCWTS).
MAYETTA’S TRUEX BOTHERS: Toyota driver Truex is originally from nearby Mayetta, New Jersey, where he grew up helping with his family’s fishing business and racing throughout the northeast before making the jump to NASCAR. Truex, the 2004 and 2005 NXS champion, has nine-career MENCS victories and currently ranks first in the series point standings. In 12 races this season, he has eight top-10 results, has led 769 laps – the most this year and nearly 200 more laps than Busch in second. His younger brother, Ryan Truex, will race a Tundra in the NCWTS race at Dover on Friday. The younger Truex currently ranks ninth in the NCWTS standings with three top-10 results in five events.
ROCK THE BELL: After finishing fourth in his NASCAR XFINITY Series debut at Charlotte Motor Speedway last weekend, Toyota’s Christopher Bell will return to his Toyota Tundra sitting second in the NCWTS points entering Dover. The 22-year- old driver is just 15 points behind first-place Johnny Sauter, the 2016 NCWTS champion, and Bell has one win, five top-10 finishes and three poles in five Truck Series contests this year. In just the span of a few months, Bell won the Chili Bowl, one of midget racing’s marquee events, in January; he then triumphed in the NCWTS at Atlanta in March, marking his third- career Truck win; and he recorded a top-five result in his NXS debut, finishing one positon better than he did in his NCWTS start in 2015, a fifth-place result at Iowa Speedway.
Staying Connected: You can follow Toyota Racing on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter by using #ToyotaNation and online at www.toyotaracing.com. For media images, please visit www.toyotaracingmedia.com.
Toyota at Dover – Notes & Numbers:
Matt Kenseth has the most top-10 finishes (24) among active drivers at the Monster Mile, where he also has two career victories … Kenseth will have ToyotaCare on the hood as his primary sponsor at Dover … Dover is the site of Truex’s first career MENCS win, which he earned in 2007 … Hamlin has earned three poles at Dover since 2012 and has started 10th or better in nine-of- the-last 10 races in Delaware … Both Erik Jones and Daniel Suárez will run Joe Gibbs Racing Camrys in the NXS race at Dover … The Dover NXS race marks Toyota’s 350th in the series since entering NXS action in 2007 … 17-year- old Todd Gilliland, the 2016 NASCAR K&N Pro Series East (NKNPSE) champion, will make his NCWTS debut at Dover in a Kyle Busch Motorsports (KBM) Tundra … 16-year- old Harrison Burton will make his third-career NCWTS start in a KBM Tundra at Dover … After Friday’s NCWTS race, both drivers will then compete in the NKNPSE in Memphis on Saturday.
Toyota 2017 Statistics:
Series Races Starts (Drivers) Wins Stage Wins Top 5s Top 10s Poles Times Led Laps Led
MENCS 12 105 (13) 2 12 14 30 1 73 1,673
NXS 10 69 (21) 3 5 11 17 2 33 387
NCWTS 5 57 (16) 3 6 12 28 3 39 523
