BRISTOL, Tenn. — NASCAR’s annual midweek day of racing at Bristol Motor Speedway had barely commenced when penalties from Michigan resulted in Grant Enfinger losing points he earned just days earlier. By night’s end, he brought his truck home to a fourth-place finish in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series UNOH 200 and salvaged some of those lost points.
Following the LTi Printing 200 at Michigan International Speedway, Enfinger was hit with two penalties, resulting in a double-encumbered finish. The first penalty was the result of a post-race ride-height violation, and the second was a safety violation for crew chief Jeff Hensley for an “improperly affixed” weight. The subsequent 10-point penalty resulted in him going from 14 points back of teammate Ben Rhodes, to 24 behind.
But his performance through the day and evening at Thunder Valley demonstrated bridging the gap might not be a tall task. He finished 11th and seventh in the day’s practice sessions, and qualified his car seventh for the race.
While Enfinger didn’t race “under the radar,” as he did finish top-10 (fifth and ninth) in both the first and second stage, he never posed a threat to Kyle Busch’s dominance, as had teammate Matt Crafton. But he drove his way through traffic, both lead and lapped, and drove it to a fourth-place finish as the checkered flag waved.
“ We had a decent restart there at the end, and we really had a good Champion Power Equipment Tundra all day,” Enfinger said. “We weren’t great. The 46 (Kyle Busch) – he’s really good at this racing stuff. He made us all look bad. But a solid run for us. We’ll take it. We need a little bit more, but very, very proud of everybody on this ThorSport Racing team. We had to battle through some adversity this week, but we still got some more to come, so we’ll keep fighting strong.”
Enfinger leaves Bristol seventh in points. Unfortunately, teammate Rhodes, who currently occupies the cutoff spot, out-pointed him, in spite of a fifth-place finish. He trails Rhodes by 26 with two races to go in the Truck Series regular season.
