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NASCAR Camping World Truck Series teams will return from a five-week break in the 2017 schedule this week when they arrive at Kansas Speedway for Friday night’s Toyota Tundra 250 (8:30 p.m. ET, FS1, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
Many of the teams took part in a one-day test at Charlotte Motor Speedway on May 2 to prepare not only for the upcoming race at CMS, but for other intermediate track stops on this year’s schedule — including Kansas.
The last event for the series came April 1 at Martinsville Speedway.
“At the end of the day we have probably three or four different setups and things to try,” said ThorSport Racing driver Matt Crafton, a two-time series champion. “We know what our package was that we won with here (at CMS) last year; we know we ran pretty good on the mile and a halves.
“Junior (Joiner, crew chief) and the guys back at the shop have been working on a lot of things, a lot of ideas. We’ll try those and hopefully we’ll find something that has a little bit more speed.”
Last year, Crafton finished second at Kansas, then won at Dover and Charlotte to move from 11th in points to the top of the standings. But a fire at the team’s Sandusky, Ohio, headquarters in early June stymied any summer progress and left the multi-team organization struggling to keep pace.
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This year, the group’s intermediate track program appears once again formidable — Crafton finished second to Christopher Bell at Atlanta, a 1.54-mile configuration.
“Our 1.5-mile program has been one of our very strong programs so I feel very confident,” said Crafton, driver of the No. 88 Toyota. “Last year we ran so good at Kansas and Charlotte and Dover, then went to Texas had a great run there as well, and then came back and the shop burned down and it all went downhill from there.”
The fire left the group working in various smaller shops located in and around its Sandusky base. “It really, really put a damper on our season last year,” he said.
Although he didn’t win a third title — something done by only two other drivers in the series — Crafton, 40, did make the series’ playoff and nearly came away with the championship before finishing four spots behind GMS driver Johnny Sauter at Homestead-Miami Speedway.
“To dig ourselves out of that hole, go to Homestead and have a shot at winning the championship,” was big, Crafton said. But to come up short after all the adversity?
“That was the worst thing that could have happened because I wanted that championship as much as I wanted the first championship just for the sake of (team owners) Duke and Rhonda (Thorson) and what every one of those guys at ThorSport had to work through,” he said.
Notes: William Byron, now competing for JR Motorsports in the NASCAR XFINITY Series, won last year’s Truck Series race at Kansas. … The last four Truck Series races have been won from the pole, including the 2016 season-ending race at Homestead. The only other time the series had four consecutive winners from the pole came in 2000-01 (final three races of ’00 and first of ’01) … Sauter, the defending series champion, is the points leader (140), Bell is second (136) and Crafton third (117). … Bell, Kaz Grala and Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series driver Chase Elliott have accounted for this season’s three wins in the Truck Series.