Nemechek, Gragson Score Wins at Kansas

The NASCAR Weekend at Kansas Speedway featured a triple-header between all three circuits, which involved the Truck Series final race of the first round of the playoffs and the second to last race of the regular season for the Xfinity Series.

For the Camping World Truck Series, Carson Hocevar looked well on his way to scoring his first career win until running out of fuel on the final lap in turn two, handing the lead to John Hunter Nemechek of Kyle Busch Motorsports. In the final 28 laps, Nemechek pitted under green on Lap 103, then overcame a 20-second deficit to Hocevar, who had made his last pit stop on Lap 80 to top off and tried to make it the rest of the way without another pit stop. The victory was Nemechek’s second of the season and 13th of his Truck Series career.

As Nemechek advanced to the Round of 8, Hocevar was eliminated from the playoffs by three points, as Christian Eckes made a huge run at the end to finish 10th and claim the final spot in the Round of 8.

“Into (Turn) 3 coming to the white flag, I started to sputter, and I knew it was game over,” Hocevar said. “The 19 had an issue, and I lost three seconds there. Looking back, I wish I could have gotten those back. Phil Gould made a hell of a call. I didn’t see it. Fifty-six laps to go, there’s going to be a yellow, right? Cutoff race, and it’s the Truck Series of all things… How was I to know the 19 was going to have a flat right in front of me?

“We deserved to win that race, just on strategy. We were nowhere near the best car. Seems like I always run second to him (Nemechek), but they were the class of the field all night. We got beat. We had the winning strategy. It just didn’t work out…”

It’s huge,” said John Hunter Nemechek after the race. “I just want to say thank you to everyone at Kyle Busch Motorsports. I can’t thank them enough for the truck they gave me tonight. It was absolutely unreal.

“We started on the pole, won both stages, led a ton of laps, and won the race. We came in really good in points, but we were able to get some more playoff points, and it puts us in a good spot. We have some momentum on our side heading into Bristol.”

The Truck Series heads next to Bristol Motor Speedway on Thursday, September 15th at 9 PM EST to open the Round of 8 in the playoffs. Carson Hocevar and three-time series champion Matt Crafton were eliminated.

The Xfinity race on the other hand ended up being shortened due to rain, giving Noah Gragson his seconds win in a row, as he won at Darlington last week. Gragson survived a two-lap shootout against teammate Justin Allgaier to win the second stage, after which the race was considered official. Ty Gibbs led a lot of the race and looked to have the most dominant car, however, Gragson moved from sixth to first on a restart on lap 76 to grab the lead and stay there with the weather coming.

“The 54 was really fast all day,” Gragson said. “The pit crew did a good job all day keeping us in contention. That restart was the most important part of the race today. Yeah, it’s a rain victory, but we came off pit road third behind the 54 and 19.

“They both took the top, and I chose the bottom, third row. I restarted inside the 19, and I could see the 54 pushing the 07. He was spinning his tires pretty bad. I got to the lead on those guys, and that kind of was the game-changer on today’s race. I think we all knew that we were racing to halfway or a little after.”

The Xfinity Series’ regular-season finale is will be Friday, September 16th at Bristol Motor Speedway at 7:30 PM EST.