NASCAR
A Look at Cinderellas in the Making for the 2024 Craftsman Truck Series
Five championship contenders went to Truck Series victory lane so far in 2024. That leaves five more drivers in the postseason looking to play upset and get hot at the right time. A lot of talent is on display from young and experienced truckers alike, all gunning for the big trophy at Phoenix. Here are the second half of the Craftsman Truck Series Playoff grid, ahead of their title trek starting this weekend.
Grant Enfinger – 2,007 points
Last year’s title runner-up by a truck-length, Grant Enfinger made the offseason transition over to CR7 Motorsports. The returning driver and team pairing have combined for eight top-10s so far, with a best finish of second coming twice. Enfinger is one of the most experienced drivers in the Truck Series Playoffs, making his sixth appearance. Still trying to gel with a new team, Enfinger says they have a lot of runway left.
“Going into this year I wouldn’t have [known what to expect]” Enfinger said. “I wouldn’t have come over to CR7 Motorsports if I didn’t feel like we had the ingredients to be successful. But yeah, I’d say the the first third of the season performance, and just our speed and our execution and myself, and just as a whole, I feel like we we did not meet expectations. I feel like this kind of middle stint of the season we have met our expectations. But from a long-term standpoint, and from continuing to progress through the end of the year, we’ve got a long ways to go and we know that.”
“I guess what has been pretty cool for for myself is, towards the end of last year, I was working towards this. Having a lot of the conversations that I don’t normally have from manufacturers and sponsors and personnel. To kind of have some early struggles, and then to kind of come to our own here towards the middle part of the season, to still have a vision for what we want to be successful long-term, and to see everybody buying in has been pretty cool. So yeah, definitely proud of our progress. But we all know we’ve got a long ways to go.”
Enfinger heads to the opening Truck Playoff round at Milwaukee as the defending winner. No other driver in the field has won a Truck Series race on the aged surface, giving Grant an advantage out of the gate. Enfinger’s team is seemingly trending towards a breakout first win. Second, third, and fourth are their last three finishes. Do not be surprised to see the veteran eek out a win and perhaps go on a postseason tear.
Tyler Ankrum – 2,007 points
Making his first postseason showing in four years is Tyler Ankrum, now in the McAnally-Hilgemann Racing No. 18. Two past berths may not sound like much, but it’s leaps and bounds more than some of Ankrum’s competition. Truck 18 has seemingly done everything shy of win this year. Ankrum believes his past years of Truck racing have him in the right Playoff mindset.
“I’ve always felt like I was a playoff driver,” Ankrum said. “The position I was in the past couple of years, I don’t feel it was a necessarily advantageous one. So I can look at those two years where I grew as a person, matured as an adult, if you will. I feel like those lessons of being in those experiences really taught me to appreciate the playoff drivers.”
“Being one yourself, I feel like that’s something where I can look into this year. A lot of guys. It’s only their first year, or even second year in the playoffs where I know this is my third time. I have a year, couple more years experience. I can really use that to my advantage. And I really look at that as a strength of mine. There’s been a lot to learn a lot to improve on myself, to be into the position that I am right now.”
Similar to Enfinger, Ankrum has put up eight top-10s in 16 races. Consistency saw this team lead the points for the first several weeks of 2024 as well. If that top-five presence returns, chances at knocking on victory lane’s door should come. Laps and years of past time in similar pressure-packed environments should pay off for the entire 18 crew as well.
Taylor Gray – 2,003 points
Making his maiden postseason on the heels of his hotshot teammate is Taylor Gray. Still competing in his first full-time season, the younger Gray brother put a second TRICON Garage Toyota into contention alongside Corey Heim. Gray’s season can be characterized as very hot and cold, but he enters the homestretch on a heater. Finishing third at Richmond was arguable Gray’s most complete race yet. Driver 17 knows he must be a few steps higher to truly contend for the title though.
“The big thing is we are going to have to go and win races, starting in Milwaukee hopefully,” Gray said. “If you go back and look, I think it is fair to say that we should have three wins on the side of our truck this year – just kind of failed to execute some of these races out. So I think the big thing is executing these races, especially executing at the end of these races and picking up some of those wins.”
“Honestly, [I’m] just taking it a race at a time. Luckily, I think this first round of the Playoffs for our company as a whole has a pretty good set of tracks coming up. So I’m more looking at a bigger picture. Yeah, just taking it one race at a time – focusing, and not changing much to what we’ve done all year long. Just show up to the racetrack prepared, and kind of just have to go through the weekend and do the same thing we’ve been doing all year long. I don’t know if much will change.”
“I think Kansas, Milwaukee is one of them coming up, Homestead – I’m really excited for. Bristol, I think we have a good package for Bristol. I think there is quite a bit of racetracks coming up for us that are really good race tracks for us. Whenever we do make it to that final round, Phoenix is a really good race track for our company as a whole.”
If any semblance of Heim’s dominant pace trickles over to Gray, then the competition should be worried. This second Toyota team in the 10-man cut can make some noise, especially given their recent weeks. Gray was the first man in Truck Series history to make the Playoffs entering the regular season finale on the outside looking in. Points racing was already in their weekly regimen; the shift to Playoff mode is nearly nonexistent for this team. Gray is currently the last man in the Round of 8, this points gap may only grow after this weekend.
Ben Rhodes – 2,002 points
Reigning champion Ben Rhodes has fallen a bit off expectations in his title defense year. The ThorSport driver has only tallied six top-10s, with a best finish of third. Past Playoff experience is worth its weight in gold, however. Rhodes leads all Playoff-bound Truckers in his seventh postseason. Alas, coming into the Playoffs winless for the first time in his career has not phased the two-time champion.
“Just the fact that we’ve done it, I think that’s gonna tell us we can do it again,” Rhodes said. “I don’t mean that rude in any way, it’s just that we have the blueprint. We’ve done it twice and we’ve done it when our back has been against the wall. We’ve done it when we had to get in on tiebreakers. Where we had to do crazy strategy and we’d get in on a point. We’ve been put through the crucible. We’ve gone through the wringer and somehow we’ve found a way to still make it to the next round. I can thoroughly say that the pressure doesn’t get to us at all.”
“If we make any mistakes, it will be just from sheer incompetence. It won’t be from nervousness or feeling any sort of pressure. I can say at the racetrack now that I feel pretty locked in with all of my guys. I’ve been pretty hard on some people and hard on myself, but I’ve been like that for years. I just try to demand the best that we can out of everybody and, of course, of myself. We ask a lot as far as accountability goes and I think that’s all needed right now, especially with our current situation. I feel good about it, I really do.”
“The first round here, with these three races, are races that our stats don’t show well at. But they don’t show well at the first two simply because we had a mistake last year at Milwaukee. We got involved in a wreck at Bristol and then Kansas I think that got a little bit away from our setup, so we’ll work on that one. All in all, it’s a good round for us. If we just do our part, I think we can make it in just fine.”
“The speed can be there. We’ve got to unload a little closer, though. That’s kind of where we’re at with this Next Gen practice session. You have to unload off your transporter straight from the race shop perfect, and there’s no opportunity to really tune on the truck.”
“There are a lot of times where I know what’s wrong, but I don’t have the tools available to me to fix it. When you’re at the racetrack, you’ve got packers, so you can adjust your bar load and the actual splitter gap. You can work on air pressures. You can work on spring rubbers, track bar, wedge – stuff like that. That’s all fine-tuning tools. It’s not really anything you can do to wholesale the truck or get it closer. You can’t change anything really, so it’s just something that we’ve got to do a little better job of unloading close and making sure that when we’re there the tools that are available to us actually help us rather than saying, ‘Well, there’s nothing in our toolbox we can do right now.‘”
If teammate Ty Majeski is any indication, then ThorSport still builds winning trucks and is capable of getting the job done. Rhodes is admittedly in rare form though being such a deep seed. Ninth in points forces team 99 to be on the offense from lap one. Three clean races and some poor results from competitors may give Rhodes a path ahead though. Rhodes will likely have to rely on gaining Stage points though, somewhere he’s been lacking all season.
Daniel Dye – 2,001 points
Sophomore driver and Playoff rookie Daniel Dye was the last one into the 10-man cut. The third McAnally-Hilgemann team has turned heads this year; their efforts are highlighted with a Nashville runner-up. Aside from that however, Dye is very much playing with house money in the forthcoming Playoff push. Dye’s mental state is in the right area to go far in these Playoffs, and his pace is slowly getting better too.
“I feel pretty good, it’s super exciting to be in this position,” Dye said. “Something that Josh Wise told me before the race at Richmond is pressure is a privilege. I’m privileged to be in in this position, and have performed well enough with my team to be in this position, so just got to keep riding that wave.”
“I feel like we all are pretty confident right now with with how we’ve been running lately. With the stage points we’ve been grabbing, having decent finishes, so we just gotta keep riding that wave. Hopefully it’ll take us all the way to the West Coast.”
“Our biggest hurdle right now is going to be other lack of playoff points that we have. But you know we’re only like six or seven points out of fifth. Just got to keep doing what we’re doing. Seven points isn’t a ton, like we were five out at Richmond. We got three races to get caught up. I think we’re only like one or two out of eighth. Just gonna get there first. But it would be cool to win a race or win a couple of stages or something to have a couple buffer points before we go to Martinsville, Homestead, and Talladega.”
As mentioned above, Dye may be the bottom of the grid but it’s a dogfight through several positions. Merely a 10-point gain would vault Dye up five spots on the leaderboard. If Dye’s recent run of consistency can remain and he gains stage points, others should see inevitable issues. Do not overlook team 43 simply because they’re starting behind everyone else.
Only six points lie between the five drivers listed here, making this cut line battle very tight. Two of the 10 teams are bound to be eliminated after three races, but it’s anyone’s guess as to who they are. Much focus will rightly be put on the fight atop the championship standings. The back half of the Playoff grid could not be any more evenly-matched however. Five guys are all within arm’s reach of each other and a ticket to the next round. It will be very fun to see how these drivers shift over the opening round.
Written by Peter Stratta
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Photo Credit to Sean Gardner/Getty Images
