Kaden Honeycutt’s Runner-Up at the Rock Begs the Question: To Be or Not To Be a Teammate?

Rockingham, N.C. — “Heim Time” never rang more true than at Rockingham Speedway’s second race back since returning to the NASCAR schedule last season.

Corey Heim dominated the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race at The Rock on Friday (April 3), sweeping the stages and leading 178 of 200 laps en route to the 25th win of his Truck career. The victory gives him sole possession of fifth place on the all-time wins list for the series, trailing only Kyle Busch, Ron Hornaday Jr., Mike Skinner, and Jack Sprague.

As soon as Heim rocketed to the lead, it seemed like the race was as good as his.

That is, good as his until Kaden Honeycutt entered the chat.

Heim sped away with the lead on the final restart with just under 30 laps remaining, but Honeycutt kept him honest in the closing laps.

Then, with roughly five laps remaining, the young star who inherited Heim’s ride from last season (a year in which Heim won 12 races and the title) started putting the pressure on the reigning champion.

With four laps to go, Honeycutt got a run on his TRICON Garage teammate, but was hindered by another teammate, Gio Ruggiero. After recomposing himself, Honeycutt made another charge, this time getting to the outside of Heim as they took the white flag.

Honeycutt edged ahead of Heim as the duo raced down the backstretch, but yet again, lapped traffic, and another teammate, was in Honeycutt’s path in the form of Tanner Gray.

Honeycutt gave Gray a shove down the backstretch in hopes of moving him down to block Heim, but as they entered turn 3, Heim surged through the final set of corners to hold on for the win.

And once again, Honeycutt came home a bridesmaid.

“Maybe I could have pinched Corey off a little more entering [Turn] 3, but at the same time, he’s there,” Honeycutt said. “I can only push myself so much before I crash myself, right? I think that would have been a terrible look for us as an organization. I have a ton of respect for Corey. He’s done a lot for this organization and won plenty of races obviously. I obviously wanted to make sure either one of us won, or whether it was me or him, that we come back with clean trucks.

Though Honeycutt encountered not one, but two of his teammates that arguably can be pointed to as circumstances that affected his charge, Honeycutt dismissed any notion of wrongdoing by either Ruggiero or Gray.

“Ultimately, it changed the way the finish was I think, but they’re racing for a spot, so you can’t blame them for anything,” Honeycutt said. “At the end of the day, it’s up to me to figure out how to win the race in lapped traffic, and Corey did a great job navigating traffic.”

As far as those lapped teammates go, Gray said he did what he thought was best to avoid affecting the finish, and he felt mixed emotions on the way it turned out.

“Honestly, I didn’t know right up until the [No.] 11 was there (on the side-by-side battle for the win). “I know the [No.] 1 had went to the bottom, so I tried to give [Honeycutt] the top, and then the 11 got to my bumper down the back, so my plan was just to try and pull up in [Turns] 3 and 4 and let them go. Obviously, I’ll have to go back and look at it and see if I could have gotten out of the way a little bit faster, but I was all the way out of the gas letting those guys pass me.”

It certainly stirs up the question of how teammates should race each other in the closing laps, especially when two are going for a win. However, in real time, it looked as though Gray gave both Heim and Honeycutt room, with the former getting a great run through the corners.

At the end of the day, Honeycutt is left still searching for that elusive first victory, but that day seems to be right around the corner.

“I hate that I have to keep learning stuff, but it’s just part of having to win these races — it’s such a different race craft from late models,” Honeycutt said. “Now that I’ve been running up front and learning how to win them, I just need to execute and get it done.”