NASCAR Truck Series: Grant Enfinger wins 2018 World of Westgate 200
By Asher Fair
Grant Enfinger earned his first victory of the 2018 NASCAR Truck Series season in the second playoff race, the South Point 400, at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
ThorSport Racing’s Grant Enfinger earned his first victory of the 23-race 2018 NASCAR Truck Series season in the season’s 18th race, the South Point 400, at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. This race was the second of three races in the opening round of the playoffs, the round of 8.
Enfinger won the 144-lap race, which was scheduled to be a 134-lap race but was extended by 10 laps due to several late caution flag periods that kept sending the race into additional overtime periods, around the four-turn, 1.5-mile (2.414-kilometer) Las Vegas Motor Speedway oval in Las Vegas, Nevada by 0.142 seconds in his #98 Ford over second place finisher Johnny Sauter of GMS Racing in his #21 Chevrolet.
Enfinger, who started the race in third place, took the lead on the final restart with just two laps to go. Hattori Racing Enterprises’ Brett Moffitt had the lead on the restart, but he lost several positions due to the fact that he appeared to be running out of gas. He rebounded to finish in 11th place.
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GMS Racing’s Justin Haley, the winner of the first race of the playoffs, the Chevrolet Silverado 250, at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park almost three weeks ago, finished the race in third place in his #24 Chevrolet. ThorSport Racing teammates Ben Rhodes, Matt Crafton and Myatt Snider rounded out the top six in fourth, fifth and sixth in their #41 Ford, #88 Ford and #13 Ford, respectively.
Premium Motorsports’ Ross Chastain finished in seventh place in his #15 Chevrolet. On Point Motorsports’ Austin Theriault was the highest finishing Toyota driver of the race, which was his first race of the 2018 season. He finished in eighth in his #30 Toyota.
Niece Motorsports’ Austin Wayne Self and DGR-Crosley’s Chris Eggleston rounded out the top 10. They finished in ninth and 10th place in their #22 Chevrolet and #54 Toyota, respectively.
The race featured a total of 21 lead changes among nine drivers. Aside of Enfinger, who led more laps than anybody else in the field with 40 laps led, eight drivers led at least one lap of the race. Those drivers were Sauter, Rhodes, Crafton, Moffitt, Stewart Friesen, race polesitter Noah Gragson, Jordan Anderson and Todd Gilliland. Gragson won stage one and Enfinger won stage two.
The race also featured a total of 11 caution flag periods for 47 laps. Two of these 11 caution flag periods took place as a result of the usual endings of stages one and two while the other nine took place as a result of on-track incidents. Of the 32 drivers who started the race, 20 finished it. All but three of the 20 drivers who finished it finished it on the lead lap.
Here are the full race results of the 2018 World of Westgate 200 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
Race Results |
1st – Grant Enfinger |
2nd – Johnny Sauter |
3rd – Justin Haley |
4th – Ben Rhodes |
5th – Matt Crafton |
6th – Myatt Snider |
7th – Ross Chastain |
8th – Austin Theriault |
9th – Austin Wayne Self |
10th – Chris Eggleston |
11th – Brett Moffitt |
12th – Jennifer Jo Cobb |
13th – Korbin Forrister |
14th – Justin Fontaine |
15th – Jesse Little |
16th – Bayley Currey |
17th – Stewart Friesen |
18th – Noah Gragson |
19th – Timothy Peters |
20th – Jordan Andrerson |
21st – T.J. Bell |
22nd – Austin Hill |
23rd – Cody Coughlin |
24th – Cody Coughlin |
25th – Cory Roper |
26th – Brandon Jones |
27th – Todd Gilliland |
28th – Wendell Chavous |
29th – Riley Herbst |
30th – Bo LeMastus |
31st – Joe Nemechek |
32nd – Tanner Thorson |
The next NASCAR Truck Series race is the third and final race of the round of 8. That race is not scheduled to take place until Saturday, October 13. That race, the Fr8Auctions 250, is scheduled to begin at 1:00 p.m. ET, and it is set to be broadcast live on FOX from Talladega Superspeedway in Lincoln, Alabama.