Garrett Smithley will be driving the No. 78 Chevrolet Camaro for B.J. McLeod Motorsports in the upcoming NASCAR Cup Series race at Talladega Superspeedway on Sunday, June 21, where he will start at the rear of the 40-car field.
Smithley’s move to B.J. McLeod Motorsports will mark the third team the Ligonier, Pennsylvania, native has driven for this season. Through the first 13 races of this year’s Cup season, he competed in eight with Rick Ware Racing and two with Spire Motorsports while sitting out the 62nd running of the Daytona 500. Sunday’s event will mark his first NASCAR premier series start in one of the world’s fastest superspeedway venues in Alabama. He has competed at Talladega in the last four seasons in the Xfinity Series, achieving a best result of 10th in 2018 while driving for JD Motorsports.
Smithley’s move to B.J. McLeod Motorsports for Talladega comes a day after it was announced that team owner/driver B.J. McLeod will be driving the No. 77 OilFire Rye Whiskey Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 1LE for Spire Motorsports on Sunday. James Davison, a native from Melbourne, Australia, who has a deep racing background in sports cars and IndyCar along with making four Xfinity Series career starts, was initially scheduled to make his Cup Series debut this Sunday at Talladega with Spire Motorsports. Though Davison was approved to run earlier this week, NASCAR reconsidered their approval for the Australian to run the superspeedway event since there will be no practice or qualifying session prior to the race. Davison will wait until next weekend at Pocono Raceway to make his Cup and NASCAR oval debut with Spire Motorsports.
The NASCAR Cup Series’ 13th race of the season at Talladega Superspeedway will air on June 21 at 3 p.m. ET on FOX.
