NASCAR’s latest winner in the Camping World Truck Series admitted after the fact that “I didn’t even know how to do a burnout,” but William Byron likely will have plenty of more opportunities to figure out that portion of the post-race celebration.
Less than a week ago, the 18-year-old won in just his fifth career start in the series, piloting the Kyle Busch Motorsports No. 9 Toyota to victory at Kansas Speedway.
“I just kind of found the gears and watched the smoke in the back and it was just really cool,” Byron said of his celebration after losing the lead but rallying on a late-race restart that extended the race three laps beyond its scheduled 167-lap distance.
He became the eighth different winner for KBM, which began fielding entries in the series in 2010. Busch, the owner/driver, has earned 29 of the organization’s 47 career victories.
Byron will be chasing career win No. 2 this weekend as the NCWTS heads to Dover International Speedway for the series’ fifth stop of the season, the JACOB Companies 200, slated to get under way Friday at 5:30 p.m. ET (FS1, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio). Byron will be joined in the race by KBM teammates Christopher Bell and Daniel Suarez.
A year ago, Byron wrapped up the NASCAR K&N Pro Series East title with a ninth-place finish at Dover. It was his first time at the track and because rain forced the cancellation of practice and qualifying, his first laps on the 1-mile concrete track were run under race conditions.
“Going back and being able to have practice to wrap my hands around the race track a little bit more will be helpful,” Byron said. “But also to have that instant experience I did last year. We had 125 laps of pretty intense racing.”
Byron didn’t begin his racing career until he was 14, somewhat late by today’s standards. But he quickly moved up through the ranks and landed a Late Model ride with JR Motorsports in 2014. Last year’s K&N title came while competing for HScott Motorsports with Justin Marks.
A year ago, crew chief Rudy Fugle helped guide Erik Jones to three victories and the series championship. Helping guide another youngster into Victory Lane, he said, “was different.”
“The last couple of years I’ve had some different drivers, more drivers (who were) … expected to win more out of the box,” Fugle said. “Now, with a young driver again, and learning how to coach him and how to do the right things, it was fun to watch, too, because he’s just got the raw talent and the speed just out of the box that you don’t have to teach.”
His Kansas victory all but assured Byron of a spot in this year’s Chase for those competing in the Truck Series. The top eight drivers (based on wins and/or points) will qualify for the seven-race playoff.
Series regulars Johnny Sauter (Daytona) and John Hunter Nemechek (Atlanta) have also earned wins this season.
A dozen more races remain before the Chase gets underway. And of course there’s high school graduation.
“My graduation is May 27 and actually an off-weekend, so I’m pretty fortunate with that and get to enjoy that,” Byron said. “It’s a good balance between going to school and being a completely normal kid and people really have no idea what’s going on when we get to the race track.
“Then the cool part is that I like to just kind of do my business at school and keep my grades up and then get to the race track and enjoy myself.”
Bryon is seventh in points in the Truck Series with finishes of third and first in his last two outings. He finished 13th in the season-opening race at Daytona while engine trouble resulted in a 32nd-place finish at Atlanta.
