John Hunter Nemechek won his fourth NASCAR Camping World Truck Series race of the season at Texas Motor Speedway Saturday, June 12.
Nemechek played a great strategy in stage three, staying out as long as he could and making fast lap times to ultimately come out ahead of Chase Elliott in the final 20 or so laps.
The No. 4 Kyle Busch Motorsports driver took home his second trophy in a row after winning at Charlotte Motor Speedway two weeks ago.
“I feel like we’ve been making a statement all year,” Nemechek told Fox Sports after the race. “I feel like we’re one of the favorites every time that we show up to the racetrack. … Everyone does so good with building our trucks, I’m just lucky enough to be behind the wheel. It’s amazing to get win No. 4 here. I haven’t won with Romco Equipment on board yet in my career so finally we were able to get them a win.”
Elliott ended up second, while Ross Chastain crossed the line third for Niece Motorsports. However, he was disqualified after the race due to Rule 20.6.2.13.a: The throttle body must be used as supplied by the NT1 engine supplier without modification. As a result, Chastain will finish last. Grant Enfinger moves into third, while Austin Hill and Chandler Smith round out the top five finishers.
Stages one and two were both filled with cautions, most of which involved wrecks.
Early on, Sheldon Creed had major trouble; his truck came around as soon as it got into the traction compound. He crashed twice within a few laps, with the second one ending his day.
Crash No. 2: pic.twitter.com/O4j5CdPJ3i
— FOX: NASCAR (@NASCARONFOX) June 12, 2021
Stewart Friesen was running in the front when he came up on Carson Hocevar, who had stuck his nose on the outside to try to make a pass. Friesen clipped Hocevar’s front end, which sent the No. 52 around and hard into the inside wall.
Here's what happened between Stewart Friesen and Carson Hocevar in Texas: https://t.co/Epe6GuErzh pic.twitter.com/81Tyg8PWhb
— FOX: NASCAR (@NASCARONFOX) June 12, 2021
Later on, near the end of stage two, Drew Dollar got loose underneath Hailie Deegan and his back end came around similar to Creed’s. He hit hard into the outside wall and was physically OK, but his truck was not.
Drew Dollar climbs out and is okay after a hard hit in Texas. pic.twitter.com/xFA4ZZ48nR
— FOX: NASCAR (@NASCARONFOX) June 12, 2021
Both stages ended under yellow flag conditions.
The rest of the race went fairly clean, though Ben Rhodes hit the wall and cut a tire late, while Hailie Deegan had a penalty on pit road, leaving both drivers mired back in 27th and 25th place, respectively.
Nemechek, who started from the pole, had no problems in the final stage and stayed out longer than Elliott before making his final pit stop. He led 64 laps en route to the victory.
“Unfortunately I felt like I was right back in the same boat that I always get myself in here,” Elliott said after the race. “Just really solid, John Hunter I think got better when we moved up into the VHT (traction compound) and he did a good job making time after we pitted and then getting on and off pit road, so congrats to him and their team. We’ll try to learn.
“I still don’t feel great here, I felt like I pushed myself in the same box that I do the Cup (Series) car too. We’ll go back to work and try to do better tomorrow.”
Zane Smith, Todd Gilliland, Tyler Ankrum, Tanner Gray and Josh Berry completed the top 10 finishers.
Truck Results from Texas
The Trucks do battle next week at Nashville Superspeedway on June 18 at 8 p.m. ET, airing on FS1.
About the author
Joy joined Frontstretch in 2019 as a NASCAR DraftKings writer, expanding to news and iRacing coverage in 2020. She's currently an assistant editor and involved with photos, social media and news editing. A California native, Joy was raised watching motorsports and started watching NASCAR extensively in 2001. She earned her B.A. degree in Liberal Studies at California State University Bakersfield in 2010.
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Good move for JH to drop back and drive for Kyle.
He’s driving for Reverend Joe who took over when Baby Busch didn’t like having to pay for the trucks out of his own pocket.