Joey Finishes 11th in Return to Gateway Motorsports Park
6/14/2014In the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series (NCWTS) return to Gateway Motorsports Park, Joey Coulter started the No. 21 Allegiant Travel Chevrolet Silverado from the eighth position and captured a hard-fought 11th-place finish on Saturday. The early laps of the race looked promising when Coulter quickly made his way to the fifth position on the first lap, and the Miami Springs, Fla., native remained inside the top eight until green-flag pit stops began on Lap 57. Coulter elected to make his first trip to pit road on Lap 63 for four tires, fuel and a tire pressure and wedge adjustment. However, the caution was displayed immediately after Coulter’s pit stop for an on-track incident, and the team made the decision to take the “wave around” and return to the lead lap. Focused on returning to the front of the 32-truck field, the GMS Racing driver began picking off one truck at a time and moved back into the top five by Lap 78. The driver of the No. 21 Allegiant Travel Chevrolet was running in seventh on Lap 123 when crew chief Jeff Stankiewicz called him onto pit road for another routine green-flag pit stop. While on pit road, the caution flag flew for the fifth time causing Coulter to fall a lap down to the leader. Taking the "wave around" under caution, the 24-year-old driver was able to return to the lead lap restarting in 14th position. Coulter gained three spots in the remaining 34 laps and battled all the way to the last lap to finish 11th. Coulter sits in the 11th spot in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series driver championship point standings heading to Kentucky Speedway on June 26.
Start – 8 Finish – 11 Laps Led – 0
JOEY COULTER QUOTE:
“Our first weekend at Gateway Motorsports Park was going really well. Our GMS Racing team had a productive test day on Friday, followed by a good practice and a good qualifying run on Saturday. We started the race eighth and we were able to get into the top five - where we ran most of the night. On our last green-flag pit stop the caution came out while we were on pit road and that killed our track position that we had maintained all night. I was happy with how we performed as a team but really disappointed with the finish; I know we had a much better truck than that. I’m really proud of our Allegiant travel guys for getting these trucks better every week.”