Sprint Cup drivers Josh Wise and Landon Cassill competed in a race during their off week. A race that involved, swimming, running and biking.
The two drivers competed in the Iron Man 70.3 World Championship in Zell Am See-Kaprun, Austria. At the end of the competition, Wise finished 1,016th overall, completing the circuit in 5 hours, 13 minutes and 4 seconds.
Cassill finished ahead of Wise, 867th overall in 5 hours, 6 minutes and 4 seconds.
Today marks the final two practice sessions of the season for the Cup Series and the last race of the year for the Xfinity Series.
Here is the day’s schedule at Homestead-Miami Speedway:
8:30 a.m. – Xfinity garage opens
10 a.m. – 5:30 p.m. – Cup garage open
11:35 – 12:25 p.m. – Cup practice (NBCSN, MRN)
12:35 p.m. – Xfinity qualifying; multi-car/three rounds (NBCSN)
1:40 p.m. – Xfinity driver-crew chief meeting
2 – 2:50 p.m. – Final Cup practice (NBCSN, MRN)
3 p.m. – Xfinity driver introductions
3:30 p.m. – Ford EcoBoost 300; 200 laps/300 miles (NBCSN, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio)
Brett Moffitt beat Grant Enfinger to the checkers by two seconds to take his sixth race of the season.
Playoff contender Noah Gragson finished third.
Stewart Friesen was fourth with Sheldon Creed rounding out the top five.
Click here for complete results.
Moffitt’s victory earned him the championship. This is the first time since 1999 that the champion won the final race of the season.
With his third-place finish, Gragson finished second in the standings.
Justin Haley finished eighth in the race and third in the standings.
Johnny Sauter finished 12th in the race and fourth in the standings.
Grant Enfinger rounded out the top five.
Brett Moffitt beat Grant Enfinger by two seconds Friday night to win the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series race and the championship.
It was his sixth victory of the season.
Moffitt’s first win of the season came at Atlanta in the season’s second race but even then he was unsure if the team would have the financing to go to every race and be eligible for the playoffs.
“It’s unreal,” Moffitt said on FoxSports 1 from victory lane. “I didn’t know if I was going to get the opportunity to compete for a championship even after I got my first win.
“Everyone pulled together hard here. Back at Chicago (in June) we didn’t know if we were going to make it to the racetrack.”
Chicago was another race won by Moffitt.
Friday night, Enfinger finished second to Moffitt.
Fellow playoff contender Noah Gragson finished third. Stewart Friesen finished fourth with Sheldon Creed rounding out the top five.
MORE: Brett Moffitt seeks to join pantheon of NASCAR ‘stache champions
Moffitt achieved the title in just 36 starts – the fewest since Mike Skinner won the inaugural championship in 1995 in 20 races.
Moffitt’s championship comes with an uncertain future. He announced Thursday that he does not have a contract for next year.
Playoff contender Justin Haley finished eighth.
“We just struggled.” he said. “I don’t know why.”
Former champion Johnny Sauter battled handling problems for most of the race and was not a factor.
“It was awful,” he said. “Just no grip. We laid an egg tonight. I don’t know why.
“When you suck that bad, it’s whatever, you just go home and go what the hell happened? I’ll ask myself that for three months.”
STAGE 1 WINNER: Grant Enfinger
STAGE 2 WINNER: Brett Moffitt
MORE: Click here for complete results.
MORE: Click here for the complete points report.
WHO HAD A GOOD RACE: Jesse Little tied his career best finish of sixth (which he first scored at Iowa this June). … Tyler Dippel finished 15th to score his fourth top 15 in five Truck starts.
WHO HAD A BAD RACE: Robby Lyons slapped the wall on Lap 78; he finished 29th. … Chris Windom started 10th but hit the wall with a handful of laps remaining to finish 24th.
QUOTE OF THE RACE: “We were just too tight there (at the end). Needed to make better adjustments on pit road and that’s where it comes down to me,” Noah Gragson told FS1 after the race. “This one is going to hurt for a while.”
ROOKIE OF THE YEAR: Myatt Snider scored three top fives and eight top 10s on his way to rookie honors. Snider’s best finish this season was runner-up at Talladega. His best unrestricted finish was a third at Martinsville.
NOTABLE: This is the first time since 1999 that the champion won the season finale.
WHAT’S NEXT: Nextera Energy Resources 250 on Feb. 15, 2019 at Daytona International Speedway.
HOMESTEAD, Fla. – Denny Hamlin’s pole-winning effort Friday night made for an emotional moment in his final Cup race with close friend Mike Wheeler as his crew chief.
Hamlin’s pole also created a quandary.
With the pole, Hamlin’s Joe Gibbs Racing team has the first pick of pit stalls. Any other race, it’s an easy call: The team takes the No. 1 pit stall at the exit of pit road.
MORE: Denny Hamlin will have a new crew chief in 2019
But things are complicated because Hamlin is not in the title race and teammate Kyle Busch, who qualified second and whose team has second pick of pit stalls, is racing for a championship Sunday at Homestead-Miami Speedway (3 p.m. ET on NBC).
If Hamlin’s team takes a different pit stall, it would allow Busch to have the No. 1 stall, which is viewed as the best on pit road. That could be the difference in having the lead off pit road and could impact who wins the championship.
So, what will Wheeler do when crew chiefs make their pit stall selection Saturday morning?
“We’re paid to win races for JGR and (sponsor) FedEx,” Wheeler told NBC Sports. “It’s definitely on my mind and my heart to be aware of that for Denny and our team. Obviously, we want to win a championship for JGR, too. That’s one of the biggest goals, a bigger goal this weekend. There’s some chatter going on about that.”
In one sense, it could be an easy call — let Busch have the No. 1 pit stall. The focus in any organization at this point is on the team racing for a championship. So why not give that team that advantage?
On the other hand, Hamlin is winless this year and could have one of his best chances to score a victory and extend his streak of consecutive seasons with a win to 13. He won this race in 2013 to keep that streak alive.
“I think everything is earned,” Hamlin said. “Nothing is given. With us having the No. 1 pit stall, nobody else — none of the other competitors will have it. I don’t know. It’s a discussion. I mean, certainly I would think that (Wheeler), with the pressure always to win, you’ve got to do everything you can to win. We’ll have that discussion.”
The pit stalls at Homestead-Miami Speedway are 30-feet, 8-inches long. The camera at the end of pit road is about 40 feet from the No. 1 pit stall. That’s closer than some other tracks. That means a driver in that stall can fire out of the pit stall and surge ahead of those coming down pit road.
Last year, Hamlin’s team faced a similar issue but it was an easier call. Hamlin, who was not in the title race, won the pole. Martin Truex Jr., a title contender, qualified second last year. Truex’s team — which has a technical alliance with Joe Gibbs Racing — asked if Hamlin’s team could take another pit stall so Truex could have the No. 1 stall. Hamlin’s team declined.
