Photo Credit: Ashley McCubbin
Continuing his trend of being consistent on a week-to-week basis, Matt Crafton has once again put himself in championship contention for the third straight season. The ThorSport Racing driver has won the championship the previous two years, and will look to close the gap on a third this weekend at Canadian Tire Motorsports Park.
“Racing at Canadian Tire Motorsports Park is a lot of fun, I love road racing,” he commented. “Unfortunately, we haven’t had the best finishes. We finished sixth there last year, but we were a lot better last year, than we were the first year we were there.”
Crafton admitted that they were horrendous in the inaugural Chevrolet Silverado 250 at CTMP in 2013 as he ran just outside of teh top-10 most of the day, staying out of the chaos at the end to score a 10th place finish. Last year, though, he was much better as he ran closer to the front, putting himself in contention for the victory. He crossed the line with a sixth place finish.
“Last year we made a lot of changes, and improvements,” Crafton continued. “Junior (Carl Joiner, crew chief) never settles down, we talk every day, and I know we will be a lot better this year, from where we were last year.”
Crafton is hoping to score his first top-five north of the border this weekend and erase the four points that separate him from points leader Tyler Reddick. While Crafton has ran the previous two events at CTMP, this year marks Reddick’s first trip to the road course.
“It doesn’t race like your average road course, because it doesn’t have a whole lot of heavy breaking, and places to be able to pass,” Crafton explained. “It’s just a really fast-flowing road course. We only do it once a year, so it’s just getting back into the groove of things when you unload.”
With practice and qualifying scheduled for Saturday, Crafton will certainly be looking to find a good feel quickly to ensure a solid qualifying spot in the truck’s lone road course event of the season.
