Toyota Post-Race Recap
NASCAR XFINITY Series (NXS)
Iowa Speedway
Race 14 of 33 – 218.75 miles, 250 laps
June 24, 2017
TOYOTA FINISHING POSITIONS
1st, William Byron*
2nd, Ryan Sieg*
3rd, Tyler Reddick*
4th, Ross Chastain*
5th, DAKODA AMSTRONG
13th, JJ YELEY
15th, DYLAN LUPTON
16th, CHRISTOPHER BELL
22nd, MATT TIFFT
31st, KYLE BENJAMIN
38th, CARL LONG
*non-Toyota driver
TOYOTA DRIVER POINT STANDINGS**
1st, Elliott Sadler* 502 points*
9th, MATT TIFFT 310 points
11th, DAKODA ARMSTRONG 276 points
15h, JJ YELEY 225 points
*non-Toyota driver
**unofficial point standings
· Camry driver Dakoda Armstrong claimed fifth place with the top-finishing Toyota in Saturday night’s NASCAR XFINITY Series (NXS) race at Iowa Speedway.
· Armstrong’s fifth-place result ties his previous career-best finish – a fifth-place result at Iowa in July 2016.
· Camry driver Christopher Bell (16th) led the field three times for a race-high 152 laps (of 250) and was in first place when he was collected in an accident with just 32 laps remaining.
· Bell won the pole position for the race, his second-career start in the NXS. The Camry driver also won the race’s opening stage.
· Camry driver Dylan Lupton (15th) led the field once for five laps on the 0.875-mile track.
TOYOTA QUOTES
DAKODA ARMSTRONG, No. 28 WinField United Toyota Camry, JGL Racing
Finishing Position: 5th
How were you able to tie your career-best finish coming from the rear?
“Yeah, we actually had a really fast WinField United Toyota all night – qualified seventh – just we had a flat left rear going into the race and had to start at the rear, so we were playing the strategy game right from the beginning. The car was actually I thought a top-10 car all night. We just couldn’t get the track position. Got it there at the end, but we actually didn’t have new tires in the end there. We had like 20-lap scuffs, so if we’d have had new tires I thought we had a good enough car to finish second there, but still a great job for the guys to recover from all that and get a good top-five, a good points day for us.”
How important is this win for your team right now?
“Yeah, no, it was good. We actually had a really fast WinField United Toyota all night. Even right there at the end, we – we qualified good, but we had to start at the rear, so we were playing strategy right from the beginning. At the end, we actually didn’t have a new set of tires – we only had scuffs – so if we just could have had a new set at the end, we had a car for second place. Our car was good – actually good all night. Even straight up, I think we were a top-10 car, so just couldn’t get the track position, but got it there at the end and really good strategy from the guys, so a good finish. Really needed it for our team, so that’s – we’ll ride this one for a while, so it was good.”
MATT TIFFT, No. 19 Tunity Toyota Camry, Joe Gibbs Racing
Finishing Position: 22nd
What happened with the caution coming out right after you pitted late in the race?
“Heck of a job making adjustments. I guess you can’t force luck sometimes.”
KYLE BENJAMIN, No. 18 Sports Clips Toyota Camry, Joe Gibbs Racing
Finishing Position: 31st
How was your race?
“Just kind of a long race for us. You know, we started off good. Car was pretty fast. Really loose though, but nothing we couldn’t fix in pit stops. We got it better throughout the night and ended up getting loose off into Turn 3, came around – not sure if the tire might have come apart or probably just got really loose getting in. We’ll have to talk about that and see what happened there, but after that pretty much had damage all night and couldn’t really go anywhere. Still not a bad car, but could have played out a lot better if that didn’t happen.”
