Race Recap | Pennzoil 400 Presented by Jiffy Lube

 DANIEL HEMRIC

No. 31 South Point Camaro ZL1

• Daniel Hemric qualified 34th for the Pennzoil 400 Presented by Jiffy Lube.
• The first caution of the day came out on lap 10, and Hemric pitted for tires, fuel and a right-rear adjustment on the No. 31 South Point Camaro ZL1. After restarting 31st on lap 16, the next caution came out on lap 26. Hemric radioed that the No. 31 Chevrolet fired off strong but would trend tight as he ran. Crew chief, Trent Owens, called Hemric in for tires and an adjustment under caution. After restarting 32nd, Hemric made up nine spots to finish 23rd in the first stage.
• During the first stage break, Hemric pitted for tires, fuel and an adjustment to help with right-rear lateral, before starting the second stage 24th. Hemric pitted on lap 120 but received a speeding penalty. He completed a pass-through and fell one lap down to the leaders. When the next caution fell on lap 157, Hemric was eligible for the wave around, placing him back on the lead lap. The field took the green flag with four laps remaining, as Hemric finished the second stage in 31st place.
• During the second stage break, Hemric pitted for tires, fuel and a right-side air pressure adjustment, before starting the final stage in 29th. The race remained green, and Hemric made a green-flag stop on lap 209 for four tires and fuel. Just after Hemric went down a lap, a caution came out on lap 235, giving him the free pass. He pitted for four tires under caution and restarted 24th with 26 laps remaining. Hemric cracked the top 20 for the first time on lap 243 and went on to finish the race in 19th place.

“We fired off decent in the race, but within a few laps, the No. 31 South Point Chevy just started getting tight. A speeding penalty set us back a bit, but fortunately we were able to get the lap back. We ran the best we had all day during those last couple of runs, and we were able to grab another top-20 finish.” – Daniel Hemric  

DEREK KRAUS

No. 16 Western States Flooring Camaro ZL1

• Derek Kraus qualified 33rd for the Pennzoil 400 Presented by Jiffy Lube.
• The first caution fell on lap 10, and Kraus brought the No. 16 Chevrolet to pit road for four tires and fuel before restarting 30th on lap 15. The next caution came out shortly after on lap 26, and Crew Chief, Travis Mack, elected to bring the No. 16 Chevrolet down pit road for 4 tires and fuel, along with an air pressure adjustment, as Kraus reported his car was tight on exits. Kraus restarted 30th, before finishing 24th in the first stage.
• During the stage break, Kraus reported that he was comfortable with the handling of the No. 16 Chevrolet. He pitted for four tires and fuel before restarting in 24th. Kraus made his first green-flag pit stop on lap 120 for four tires and fuel and eventually went one lap down on lap 153. When the next caution came out on lap 157, Kraus sat in the lucky dog position, putting him back on the lead lap. He pitted under caution before restarting 26th with four laps remaining. He went on to finish the second stage in 26th.
• The No 16 started the third and final stage from 18th. As the field cycled through green-flag pit stops, Kraus led his first-career laps before following suit and pitting for four tires and fuel. He went on to finish 28th in his first NASCAR Cup Series race.

“Overall, we achieved what we wanted to, and that was to complete all 400 laps. We were pretty good all day; I just have to work on my restarts and make sure I capitalize on track position when I have it. I can’t thank Kaulig Racing and Western States Flooring enough for the opportunity. I’m looking forward to Phoenix next week!” – Derek Kraus  

About Kaulig Racing

Kaulig Racing™ is a full-time multi-car NASCAR Cup Series (NCS) and NASCAR Xfinity Series (NXS) team, owned by award winning entrepreneur, Matt Kaulig. Established in 2016, Kaulig Racing™ has made the NXS Playoffs consecutively each season since the playoff system started and has won back-to-back regular-season championships. Before becoming a full-time NCS team, Kaulig Racing made multiple starts in the 2021 NCS season and won in its seventh-ever start with AJ Allmendinger’s victory at “The Brickyard” for the Verizon 200 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. The team expanded to a two-car, full-time NCS team in 2022 and added a third, part-time entry during the 2023 season. In 2024, the team will once again field two, full-time entries in the NCS and continue to field three, full-time NXS entries. To learn more about the team, visit kauligracing.com.

STEWART-HAAS RACING
Las Vegas 400

Date: March 3, 2024
Event: Las Vegas 400 (Round 3 of 36)
Series: NASCAR Cup Series
Location: Las Vegas Motor Speedway (1.5-mile oval)
Format: 267 laps, broken into three stages (80 laps/85 laps/102 laps)
Race Winner: Kyle Larson of Hendrick Motorsports (Chevrolet)
Stage 1 Winner: Kyle Larson of Hendrick Motorsports (Chevrolet)

Stage 2 Winner: Kyle Larson of Hendrick Motorsports (Chevrolet)

SHR Finish:

● Noah Gragson (Started 30th, Finished 6th / Running, completed 267 of 267 laps)
● Josh Berry (Started 26th, Finished 20th / Running, completed 267 of 267 laps)
● Chase Briscoe (Started 6th, Finished 21st / Running, completed 267 of 267 laps)
● Ryan Preece (Started 36th, Finished 23rd / Running, completed 267 of 267 laps)

SHR Points:

● Chase Briscoe (20th with 53 points, 65 out of first)
● Josh Berry (30th with 37 points, 81 out of first)
● Noah Gragson (34th with 25 points, 93 out of first)
● Ryan Preece (36th with 14 points, 104 out of first)

SHR Notes:

● Gragson earned his second top-10 of the season and his first top-10 in three career NASCAR Cup Series starts at Las Vegas.
● This was Gragson’s best finish so far this year. His previous best was ninth, earned in the season-opening Daytona 500.
● Gragson’s sixth-place result bettered his previous best finish at Las Vegas – 11th, earned in October 2022.
● This was Berry’s best finish so far this year. His previous best was 25th, earned in the season-opening Daytona 500.
● Berry’s 20th-place result bettered his previous best finish at Las Vegas – 29th, earned last March.
● Briscoe led one lap, increasing his laps-led total at Las Vegas to seven.

Race Notes:

● Kyle Larson won the Las Vegas 400 to score his 24th career NASCAR Cup Series victory, his first of the season and his third at Las Vegas. His margin of victory over second-place Tyler Reddick was .441 of a second.

● There were six caution periods for a total of 35 laps.

● Thirty-one of the 37 drivers in the race finished on the lead lap.

● Larson leaves Las Vegas as the championship leader with an eight-point advantage over second-place Ryan Blaney.

Sound Bites:

“These guys are good. It feels good to do it in front of the hometown crowd. I was battling Ty (Gibbs) and Ross (Chastain) there at the end for a top-five. I really wanted a top-five, but coming from 30th to sixth, I’m just really proud of everyone’s effort. This Mustang Dark Horse is bitchin’. It’s fast and it’s been really good. This compared to last year just has a lot more speed. You can go where you want. We’ve got a good pit crew and just a good team. We’re going to take this and get back into the positives in points and just keep on working, keep on learning and becoming better than we were yesterday and just keep that attitude. I think we’ve got the tightest group in the garage. They’re awesome to work with and I love every one of them.” – Noah Gragson, driver of the No. 10 Fanttik Ford Mustang Dark Horse

“I think we saw a lot of potential with the new (Ford Mustang Dark Horse) body style. Definitely each run it seemed like as a company, one of our cars was stronger than the other. But we learned a lot and our car definitely had some speed. We’ve just got to work on fine-tuning it and I need to work on starting just a little bit closer to the front, and all of those things start to compound and we have a little bit better of a day. But overall I thought we were solid.” – Josh Berry, driver of the No. 4 Mobil 1/Take 5 Ford Mustang Dark Horse

“Before (the contact with Ryan Blaney), I thought our car was pretty good. We weren’t good enough to win, I didn’t think, but we were definitely a fifth- to 10th-place car fairly easily. I was able to pass a lot of cars. That second run of the race, we kind of went backward, but after that we were able to continue to go forward and I was really happy with the way my car was driving. After the contact, as soon as it happened, I went into the next corner and we were a half a second slower that lap and just continued to stay a half a second slower than we had been for the rest of the race. Kind of head-scratching, not really sure what happened as far as why we lost a half a second. Definitely a tough one to swallow when we had that good of a car – we definitely had a top-10 car and ended up finishing 21st. That part’s kind of frustrating, but we’re going to Phoenix where we’ve had speed in the past and see if we can just get a better run.” – Chase Briscoe, driver of the No. 14 Mahindra Tractors Ford Mustang Dark Horse

“We just did what we could with what we had for the day. Without practice, really, what we had was really what it was going to be. That’s that.” – Ryan Preece, driver of the No. 41 HaasTooling.com Ford Mustang Dark Horse

Next Up:

The next event on the NASCAR Cup Series schedule is the Shriners Children’s 500k on Sunday, March 10 at Phoenix Raceway. The race begins at 3:30 p.m. EDT with live coverage provided by FOX and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio.

Ford Performance Notes and Quotes
NASCAR Cup Series
Pennzoil 400 | Sunday, March 3, 2024

Ford Performance Finishing Results:
3rd – Ryan Blaney
6th – Noah Gragson
9th – Joey Logano
13th – Brad Keselowski
20th – Josh Berry
21st – Chase Briscoe
23rd – Ryan Preece
24th – Todd Gilliland
25th – Michael McDowell
27th – Justin Haley
29th – Austin Cindric
30th – Harrison Burton
31st – Kaz Grala
37th – Chris Buescher

RYAN BLANEY, No. 12 Menards/Pennzoil Ford Mustang Dark Horse – “It was a long day. We started 15th and just kind of slowly worked our way up. The top two guys were pretty quick. It was hard to catch them. We never really had the speed of those guys, but I’m proud of the effort. We got better all day, which was good. I didn’t think we were great early and we continued to get better, so that’s all you can ask for. It was a good day for the Menards/Pennzoil Ford Mustang. We definitely have a decent idea of where to go from here going forward.”

DID YOU OPTIMIZE YOUR DAY TODAY? “Yeah, we worked really hard all day and got better through the race I thought. That was positive and we probably ended the best we were, so that’s always good. It’s something good to look forward to and hopefully just continue to work on. I’m proud of the Menards/Pennzoil Ford Mustang team. The 12 guys did a good job all weekend.”

HOW WAS YOUR CAR? “I thought we got better all day, which is good. Obviously, I wish we had more, but we got better all day from where we started and where we qualified. I thought we ended kind of our best probably. We were able to get in front of the 19 and the 11, who was pretty good, the 54. We didn’t have anything for the 5 or 45 all day, but I’m proud of the effort. Hopefully, this is a good learning experience. Going forward, hopefully we’re in a good spot.”

LARSON BEING FAST ISN’T A SURPRISE. IS THERE ANYTHING ELSE WE CAN TAKE FROM TODAY? “I don’t know. The Chevys are still fast. The Toyotas are still fast. The Fords, we had a good showing today too but we just have a little bit of work to do.

NOAH GRAGSON, No. 10 Fanttik Ford Mustang Dark Horse – “These guys are good. It feels good to do it in front of the hometown crowd. I was battling Ty and Ross there at the end for a top five. I really wanted a top five, but coming from 30th to sixth I’m just really proud of everyone’s effort.”

WHAT DOES THIS SAY ABOUT YOUR 1.5-MILE PROGRAM? “This is the first true testament. I don’t know. Blaney was up there and maybe a couple other guys in the Ford camp, but this Mustang Dark Horse is bitchin’. It’s fast and it’s been really good. You can see the speed that it’s had in qualifying, not for me because I drove like a sissy out there, but with the other guys they have three poles so far this year, so we’re going good.”

HOW DOES THIS COMPARE TO OTHER CUP CARS YOU’VE DRIVEN HERE? “This compared to last year just has a lot more speed. You can go where you want. We’ve got a good pit crew and just a good team.”

HOW MUCH CAN YOU TAKE FROM SOMETHING LIKE TODAY? DO YOU HAVE SPEED TO WORK WITH? “Yeah, we definitely need to be better and I need to clean some stuff up. Really, other than that last restart, I don’t think I had any net gains on restarts, so I need to keep working on that. I’m still trying to figure it all out, but overall it’s a good stepping stone to where we’re at right now. We’re gonna take this and get back into the positives in points and just keep on working, keep on learning and becoming better than we were yesterday and just keep that attitude. I think we’ve got the tightest group in the garage. They’re awesome to work with and I love every one of them.”

JOSH BERRY, No. 4 Mobil 1 Take 5 Ford Mustang Dark Horse – “I think we saw a lot of potential. Each run as a company it seemed like one of our cars was stronger than the other, but we learned a lot. Our car definitely seemed like it had speed. We just have to keep working on fine-tuning it and I need to work on starting a little bit closer to the front. All of those things start to compound and we can have a little better day, but, overall, I thought we were solid.”

CHASE BRISCOE, No. 14 Mahindra Tractors Ford Mustang Dark Horse – HOW WAS THE CAR RUNNING BEFORE CONTACT WITH THE 12 AND HOW WAS IT AFTER? “Before I thought our car was pretty good. We weren’t good enough to win, but we were definitely a fifth to 10th place car fairly easily. We were able to pass a lot of cars. That second run of the race we went backwards, but after that I was able to just continue to go forward. I was really happy with how my car was driving and just after the contact as soon as it happened I went into the next corner and we were a half-second slower that lap and just continued to stay a half-second slower the rest of the race. I’m not really sure what happened as far as why we all of a sudden lost a half-second, but it’s a tough one to swallow when you have that good of a car. We definitely had a top 10 car and finished 21st or whatever, so that part is kind of frustrating, but we’ll go to Phoenix, where we’ve had speed in the past and just hope to get a better run.”

JUSTIN HALEY, No. 51 Ohanafy Ford Mustang Dark Horse – “We were pretty good, but we just lacked execution again. I felt like our car was a little on the tight side, but when we were in clean air it was fine. It’s just new team blues. We’re just trying to get everyone to work together on the same page. I’m proud of the speed we had. I felt like we ran with some competitive cars, so we’ll keep working at it.”

KAZ GRALA, No. 15 N29 Capital Partners Ford Mustang Dark Horse – “We weren’t too bad today. We just couldn’t quite get a handle on the car. Balance-wise we were tight for the first half of the race and then somehow we got it free and couldn’t get back, so I was just kind of hanging on there at the end. We had decent track position and then a car came up in front of me and took the air away and we just bobbled and smacked the wall out of four. I don’t know if that hurt something or we really just fell off at the end tire-wise. I don’t really know. We just didn’t have anything to fight with at the end.”

CHRIS BUESCHER, No. 17 Fastenal Ford Mustang Dark Horse – WHAT HAPPENED? “We lost the nut and lost half the wheel. I think the tire stayed up under the fender. I’m not exactly sure just yet, but it looks like the nut came off and something in the suspension actually cut the wheel in half. It’s definitely not what we wanted with our Fastenal Ford Mustang out here today. We had a strong day yesterday. I was really proud of that effort. We got a good bunch here and we’re gonna be contenders. We’re gonna win some races, but it’s not gonna happen today.”

IT WAS A HARD HIT. YOU OK? “Yeah. All good.”

DID YOU HAVE ANY WARNING? “No. Nothing that says that was coming. That’s kind of been the case with this car. I’ve probably had three of these now through the last couple of years and haven’t had a warning on any of them. It’s nothing like the old five lug stuff where you’d get a vibration or a shimmy or have some kind of clue. It just happens all of a sudden. It’s very unfortunate there, very tough. We have a great group of people on our team right now and we’re gonna bounce back from this and get going in the right direction. That hurts just so early. We were able to move forward out of there. We took two tires and was doing OK and holding our own against four tires around us and just ended up out way earlier than we wanted. I guess we talked a little bit yesterday and probably truthfully for the first time in my career I’m excited about Phoenix after what we had last time there. I won’t have to lie about that, but certainly a bad day today. It’s very disappointing. That sucks.”

NASCAR CUP SERIES
LAS VEGAS MOTOR SPEEDWAY
PENNZOIL 400 PRESENTED BY JIFFY LUBE
TEAM CHEVY POST-RACE REPORT
MARCH 3, 2024

 Kyle Larson Drives Chevrolet to Third Consecutive NASCAR Cup Series Victory of the 2024 Season

 · In dominating fashion, Kyle Larson and the No. 5 HENDRICKCARS.COM Camaro ZL1 team earned their first victory of the season in the Pennzoil 400 presented by Jiffy Lube at Las Vegas Motor Speedway – extending Chevrolet’s streak as the only manufacturer to win a points-paying race in the NASCAR Cup Series this season.

· In the Next Gen car’s third season of competition in the NASCAR Cup Series, this marks the second time Chevrolet has swept the first three races of the season – also accomplishing the feat in 2023 when the Camaro ZL1 won four-straight races.

TEAM CHEVY UNOFFICIAL TOP-10:
POS. DRIVER
1st – Kyle Larson, No. 5 HENDRICKCARS.COM Camaro ZL1
4th – Ross Chastain, No. 1 Kubota Camaro ZL1
10th – William Byron, No. 24 Z HP Camaro ZL1

· Larson swept the stage wins and led a race-high 181 laps en route to his third career NASCAR Cup Series win at Las Vegas Motor Speedway – his 24th victory in 334 career starts in NASCAR’s premier series.

· The victory is Hendrick Motorsports’ series-leading 10th NASCAR Cup Series triumph at Las Vegas Motor Speedway – with five of those victories coming in the series’ past seven races at the track.

· Larson drove Chevrolet to its 13th all-time NASCAR Cup Series victory at Las Vegas Motor Speedway – four of which have come in the five races that the Next Gen car has competed at the 1.5-mile Nevada oval.

· Larson delivered Chevrolet its 854th all-time victory in NASCAR Cup Series competition, extending the manufacturer’s record as the winningest manufacturer in series’ history.

· With Larson’s NASCAR Cup Series win and Rajah Caruth’s NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series win at Las Vegas Motor Speedway this weekend, Chevrolet continues the streak of earning at least one win in the NASCAR national ranks each weekend since the Charlotte Motor Speedway Road Course events in October 2023.

· The 2024 NASCAR Cup Series season continues at Phoenix Raceway with the Shriners Children’s 500 on Sunday, March 10, at 3:30 P.M. ET. Live coverage can be found on FOX, MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio Channel 90.

 
TEAM CHEVY POST-RACE QUOTES:

Kyle Larson, No. 5 HENDRICKCARS.COM Camaro ZL1

Finished: 1st

“I knew Tyler (Reddick) was going to be the guy to beat. From the first stage, he was really fast there. I was hoping those guys were going to get racing a little bit longer behind me because I felt it was going to time out to where he was running really hard and getting the tow to catch me at the end. Thankfully, I was able to air lock him a couple of laps and get him tight. I thought (Reddick) and Bubba (Wallace) were going to get working together again to build a run, so I was happy that didn’t happen.

All in all, such a great, great job by this No. 5 HENDRICKCARS.COM Chevy team. Just their execution, restarts, pit road.. all of that was great. Cool to get a win here in Las Vegas again, back-to-back, and swept all the stages. Can’t ask for much more than that.”

Ross Chastain, No. 1 Kubota Camaro ZL1

Finished: 4th

What can you take from this mile-and-a-half and apply to others?

“This speed. I mean the handling of the car is incredible for our Kubota Chevy. It’s everything that I wanted, dream about, and wake up and train for is to drive cars like this. That’s what makes it hurt so much worse. When we finish fourth and we were legitimately an eighth-place car, it’s something we’re high-fiving. You all have seen me in my career, I’d jump up and down for a fourth place finish. If someone is just glancing at my interviews, they’re going to say, “Well, Ross is changing,” but I’m not. When I have a car capable of fighting for the win, and I take ourselves out, that’s what I can get down about right now, but excited about because I know how good the car was and how much speed it has.”

From the start of the race, speeds dropped five miles per hour in Turn 1. What was it like and how hard was it to hold on?

“Yeah, there were times where if I wasn’t tucked up within five car lengths of somebody, I’d have significantly less RPM and speed down the front. I couldn’t catch them because I was inhibited by the wind, and they had the draft. Think of the DRS trains in Formula 1. Once those DRS trains get going, the guys that are out of it, they lose so much of it. We’re not losing as much. But there were times where I was 16th place, but I’m three seconds behind 15th and there are no cars, and they get bottled up, and I get with them, and I’m picking up 200 RPMs on the front stretch just being in their draft. So, it was pretty wild because as much as I loved that draft on the straightaway, you’d get into the corner and I didn’t want to be behind them. It’s a lot of fun racing. I passed a lot of cars today. That part I was smiling, but knowing I had a car enough to compete today, it just hurts.”

Daniel Suarez, No. 99 Freeway Insurance Camaro ZL1

Finished: 11th

“It wasn’t easy. I wasn’t really happy with the balance of the No. 99 Freeway Insurance Chevy. The front of the car never turned the entire race. The back of the car was going away on the long run. Sometimes we were making the car a little bit better in the long run, but the front just never turned all race long. Just have to see everything to figure out how we can be a little better next time.”

Austin Dillon, No. 3 BetMGM Camaro ZL1

Finished: 16th

“P-16 finish for the No. 3 BetMGM Chevy. We got stage points in Stage 2. The BetMGM Chevy was pretty good in the middle of the race. Didn’t make a big enough adjustment there at the end and got really tight.

Unfortunate. We had a pretty solid day around the top-10 all day. We weren’t able to come home with one, but it was a big improvement from where we’ve been. We were one adjustment away from being in the top-10, for sure.”

Daniel Hemric, No. 31 South Point Hotel and Casino Camaro ZL1

Finished: 19th

“We fired off decent in the race, but within a few laps, the No. 31 South Point Chevy just started getting tight. A speeding penalty set us back a bit, but fortunately we were able to get the lap back. We ran the best we had all day during those last couple of runs, and we were able to grab another top-20 finish.”

About Chevrolet

Founded in 1911 in Detroit, Chevrolet is now one of the world’s largest car brands. Chevrolet models include electric and fuel-efficient vehicles that feature engaging performance, design that makes the heart beat, passive and active safety features and easy-to-use technology, all at a value. More information on Chevrolet models can be found at www.chevrolet.com.

RICK WARE RACING
Pennzoil 400

Date: March 3, 2024
Event: Pennzoil 400 (Round 3 of 36)
Series: NASCAR Cup Series
Location: Las Vegas Motor Speedway (1.5-mile oval)
Format: 267 laps, broken into three stages (80 laps/85 laps/102 laps)
Race Winner: Kyle Larson of Hendrick Motorsports (Chevrolet)
Stage 1 Winner: Kyle Larson of Hendrick Motorsports (Chevrolet)
Stage 2 Winner: Kyle Larson of Hendrick Motorsports (Chevrolet)

RWR Finish:

● Justin Haley (Started 35th, Finished 27th/ Running, completed 267 of 267 laps)
● Kaz Grala (Started 32nd, Finished 31st/ Running, completed 267 of 267 laps)

RWR Points:

● Justin Haley (29th with 39 points)
● Kaz Grala (33rd with 30 points)

Race Notes:

● Kyle Larson won the Pennzoil 400 to score his 24th career NASCAR Cup Series victory and his third at Las Vegas. His margin of victory over second-place Tyler Reddick was .441 of a second.
● There were six caution periods for a total of 35 laps.
● Thirty-one of the 37 drivers in the Pennzoil 400 finished on the lead lap.
● Kyle Larson leaves Atlanta as the championship leader with a eight-point advantage over second-place Ryan Blaney.

Sound Bites:

“We were pretty good. I felt like our Ohanafy Ford Mustang Dark Horse was a little bit on the tight side, but when we were in clean air it was good. This is still a work in progress. We’re trying to things organized so we’re all working together and getting the best out of each race. I’m proud of the speed we had. We ran with some good cars, so we’ll keep working at it and see what we’ve got when we get to Phoenix.” – Justin Haley, driver of the No. 51 Ohanafy Ford Mustang Dark Horse

“We weren’t too bad today. We just couldn’t quite get a handle on the balance of our N29 Capital Parners Ford Mustang Dark Horse. We were tight for the first half of the race, and then we somehow got it free and couldn’t really get back to somewhere in the middle. We had decent track position until someone came up in front of me and took the airway, then we just bobbled and smacked the wall out of turn four. I don’t know if that hurt something or if we just fell off at the end with older tires. I was just kind of hanging on there at the end. We’ll see what we can do to get better. The field so tight and I feel like we’re just a little bit away from being really good. Easier said than done, but I think if we can find a little something then we’ll be in good shape.” – Kaz Grala, driver of the No. 15 N29 Capital Partners Ford Mustang Dark Horse

Next Up:

The next event on the NASCAR Cup Series schedule is the Shriners Children’s 500k on Sunday, March 10 at Phoenix Raceway. The race begins at 3:30 p.m. ET with live coverage provided by FOX and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio.

REDDICK RUNNER-UP LEADS TOYOTA IN VEGAS
Ty Gibbs with a strong top-five finish

LAS VEGAS (March 3, 2024) – Tyler Reddick led Toyota with a runner-up finish in the NASCAR Cup Series race at Las Vegas Motor Speedway on Sunday afternoon. Reddick finished second in both of the first two stages and closed late on race winner Kyle Larson, before coming up just short of the victory.

Ty Gibbs added his first top-five and second top-10 in first three races this season as the reigning Rookie of the Year battled through transmission issues throughout the second half of the race to earn a Vegas-best fifth-place finish. Gibbs’ teammates Martin Truex Jr. (seventh) and Denny Hamlin (eighth) joined him inside the top-10, while Erik Jones earned points in the second stage and delivered a solid top-15 finish in LEGACY MOTOR CLUB’s first mile-in-a-half start in Toyota Camry XSEs.

Toyota Post-Race Recap
NASCAR Cup Series (NCS)
Las Vegas Motor Speedway
Race 3 of 36 – 400.5 miles, 267 laps

TOYOTA FINISHING POSITIONS

1st, Kyle Larson*
2nd, TYLER REDDICK
3rd, Ryan Blaney*
4th, Ross Chastain*
5th, TY GIBBS
7th, MARTIN TRUEX, JR.
8th, DENNY HAMLIN
14th, ERIK JONES
22nd, JOHN HUNTER NEMECHEK
33rd, CHRISTOPHER BELL
35th, BUBBA WALLACE
*non-Toyota driver

TOYOTA QUOTES

TYLER REDDICK, No. 45 Nasty Beast Toyota Camry XSE, 23XI Racing

Finishing Position: 2nd

How frustrating is it to come so close to a win today?

“Yeah, it’s just the Next Gen racing game, right? Get the lead and got to hold onto it. Yeah, Kyle (Larson) did a really good job there taking away pretty much every option I had there to close the gap. He seemed pretty good in the middle and I was obviously really good on the bottom, and he just never let me have it, right? I kept trying to run higher and higher and you know, he’s kind of running in the middle of the race track, which is pretty efficient to block both lanes. Every time I sort of got close, I mean, we’re running just wide open enough in turn one and two, you can kind of defend pretty well. It’s frustrating. I feel like we were never up front really all day long, until it got to the stage ends. We had a really good Nasty Beast Toyota Camry. Just stupid mistakes on pit road. Same shit, different year, right? Kind of frustrating. We’ll continue to work on it, but a good rebound for our team today.”

Sometimes second can be good, and sometimes it’s a bad day. On the radio, it sounds like it was the latter. Is that correct?

“Second sucks that is for sure, but we had a really fast Nasty Beast Toyota Camry. I mean, we should have been battling up there in the front more than we were today. Just put us behind, unfortunately, and had to battle through that all day. As the field got better, it got harder to get back to the front as quick. You have to run up front all day long, and when asked about what we need to do to get better, that’s the very thing, and we didn’t do it today.”

What did you need to get Kyle Larson there in the end?

“We were pretty evenly matched, so I don’t know if there was anything that I really could’ve done to get around him. He would have had to make a big mistake or had some traffic kind of knock his wind around. It’s a solid effort for our team, that’s how we need to run, but I don’t like running second.”

TY GIBBS, No. 54 He Gets Us Toyota Camry XSE, Joe Gibbs Racing

Finishing Position: 5th

What was your race like today, overcoming early adversity with a strong race car?

“Yeah, I kind of stuck us in a hole there and we broke the transmission, which is kind of unfortunate that has to happen, that’s just part of it and we fought back. I put my team in a hole there. No excuses. And we just kind of fought back and my team gave me a really great He Gets Us Camry XSE this weekend and we drove back to the front. So, just need a little bit more to get to the lead so we can go get a win, but really happy with my team.”

There was lot of unknowns coming into this race with a new car, are you happy with the speed?

“Yeah, really happy. Really excited about what our car is capable of. I feel really happy about what we have.”

ERIK JONES, No. 43 Dollar Tree Toyota Camry XSE, LEGACY MOTOR CLUB

Finishing Position: 14th

How was your race?

“Pretty up-and-down day. Up-and-down weekend really, fired off the race not where we needed to be, and had to make some really big changes the first three, four stops of the day to get the Dollar Tree Camry better. To salvage a top-15 is good, but we want more, so we will keep working on it.”

About Toyota

Toyota (NYSE:TM) has been a part of the cultural fabric in North America for more than 65 years, and is committed to advancing sustainable, next-generation mobility through our Toyota and Lexus brands, plus our more than 1,800 dealerships.

Toyota directly employs more than 63,000 people in North America who have contributed to the design, engineering, and assembly of nearly 45 million cars and trucks at our 13 manufacturing plants. By 2025, Toyota’s 14th plant in North Carolina will begin to manufacture automotive batteries for electrified vehicles. With more electrified vehicles on the road than any other automaker, Toyota currently offers 26 electrified options.

For more information about Toyota, visit www.ToyotaNewsroom.com.