Poole Earns First Career Top 10 in Trucks at Texas

By Seth Eggert, NASCAR Correspondent

NASCAR veteran Brennan Poole rebounded for his first top-10 finish in the NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series.

In a wild night Vankor 350, Poole avoided the carnage. His No. 30 Bad Boy Mowers Toyota Tundra bounced up and down the running order throughout the night. Poole narrowly avoided contact on the final restart. He quietly ran out the final laps to finish ninth.

The 147-lap race was a ‘night and day’ difference for Poole compared to last weekend where he finished 29^th at Martinsville Speedway.

The race came within one caution of matching the record for the Truck Series at Texas Motor Speedway. After starting 13^th, Poole found himself in the middle of the chaos on the 1.5-mile quad-oval.

He had to take evasive action to avoid several incidents, including ones that involved fellow Toyota Racing Development drivers Anthony Alfredo, Harrison Burton, Korbin Forrister, and Todd Gilliland.

Poole had a hand in the first incident of the night, getting collected when Gilliland was squeezed into the outside wall on the frontstretch. The lap eight incident ended Gilliland’s chances while both Poole, and Ross Chastain who was also involved, emerged unscathed.

Poole’s up and down day was evident in his stage finishes. He finished the first stage mired deep in the pack, in 23^rd. By the end of the second stage, Poole had climbed up to finish ninth, the same position he finished the race in, with the aid of a caution, which halted the action for just over 11 minutes due to a red flag for clean-up, and restarts.

The ninth-place finish, which came in Poole’s eighth series start, is his first top-10 finish in the Truck Series. It is also just the second top-10 finish for On Point Motorsports, which debuted last season.

As a result of the ninth-place finish, Poole moves from 15^th to 13^th in the championship points standings. He is 106-points behind runner-up Stewart Friesen. In the battle to make the playoffs, Poole is 55-points behind the cutoff, currently held by Todd Gilliland.