Wisconsin has another NASCAR Truck series Champion. Ty Majeski was a force of nature at Phoenix Raceway Friday night leading 132 of the 150 laps and leaving his three fellow championship contenders in the dust and wondering just what happened.
Majeski took the lead for the final time after the race’s sixth caution ended on lap 123 and never looked back scoring his sixth career win and his first title in his second fulltime season.
“I can’t believe it,” Majeski said. “A huge thank you to Duke and Rhonda Thorson, Joe Shear, Jr. He’s one bad dude. This is so much fun racing with this group.
“So proud to have the opportunity to drive these great race trucks. Man, you know, there’s a lot of times in my career where this looks like a far dream, and Duke and Rhonda really gave me my third opportunity after I had two opportunities I failed.”
For ThorSport Racing it was their second title after Ben Rhodes took the title for the same team last season.
Majeski’s domination began early, leading most of Stage 1 until lap 39 when Corey Heim grabbed the top spot six laps before the stage end. That stage ended prematurely after Frankie Muniz spun out in front of the leaders, but everyone somehow dodged him. Majeski retook the lead after pit stops when Heim slid through his stall, and by lap 71, Majeski was charging past Heim on the outside and winning Stage 2 by a comfortable 3.5 seconds.
After the pit stops Majeski retook the top spot thanks to Heim sliding through his pit stall during the stops. Jack Wood spun in Turn 2 and hit the outside wall hard on lap 59 and the second caution of the race came out.
Heim reemerged with the lead on the restart but Majeski was able to charge past Heim on lap 71 on the high side. From there he set sail, winning Stage 2 by 3.5 seconds.
It was Majeski winning the race off pit road after a round of stops at the end of the Stage with 56 to go. The green came out with 52 laps to go and again Majeski grabbed the lead. Then, chaos broke loose. Coming out of Turn 2, Connor Mosack smacked the wall, sparking a nine-truck wreck. NASCAR threw the caution, slapped Heim with a restart penalty, and brought out a red flag to clean up the debris field. After a quick six minutes, the field was back with Heim now in 19th, and Majeski casually grabbing the lead again.
After a brief 6-minute red flag, the field lined up for the restart with 44 laps to go, Heim rolled off 19th. Majeski had no issue taking back the top spot. Layne Riggs meanwhile took second, but before the lap ended, Connor Jones spun in Turn 2 bringing out the caution with Heim having rallied to 10th.
As the laps ticked down, Grant Enfinger and Christian Eckes took a gamble on fresh tires during a caution while Majeski and Heim stayed out. With 33 laps left, the green flew, but it didn’t last as Riggs spun out. Heim managed to fight his way back to second, breathing down Majeski’s neck with 27 laps to go, but Majeski was pulling away, building a lead of 2.6 seconds, then 3.4, and ultimately taking the checkered flag a comfortable 3.9 seconds ahead of Heim.
“Really disappointed to come up short like that,” Heim said. “It’s hard to even be upset. I did almost everything right except for that restart violation, but we were able to get our track position back pretty quick and make the most of it.
“I just had nothing for the 98 all day. He was so fast.”
Behind Heim, Eckes was third.
“Just didn’t have enough today,” Eckes said. “The 98 and 11 were just stronger than us. We threw a Hail Mary with the tires, and I thought for a second I would be able to catch them and just didn’t have enough.”
Nick Sanchez in his final ride with Rev Racing was fourth and Enfinger was fifth.
“I feel like we came here with the right mindset, the right game plan, and honestly pretty much the right execution for the stuff in our control,” Enfinger said. “We just flat out didn’t have the speed tonight.”
Majeski joins fellow Wisconsinites Travis Kvapil, Ted Musgrave and Johnny Sauter as Truck Series champions. And he had a message for all the other short track drivers hoping to be in his spot one day.
“It’s possible,” he said. “You need to find a way to set yourself apart from everybody else. I did that by working in the shop. Started as an engineer at ThorSport in 2021 with three or four races. Didn’t know what it was going to turn into, and damn it, now we’re champions.”
Greg is the author of "The Nuts and Bolts of NASCAR: The Definitive Viewers' Guide to Big-Time Stock Car Auto Racing" and has been published in major publications across the country including the Los Angeles Times, the Cleveland Plain Dealer and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. He was also a contributor to Chicken Soup for the NASCAR Soul, published in 2010, and the Christmas edition in 2016. He wrote as the NASCAR, Formula 1, Auto Reviews and National Veterans Affairs Examiner for Examiner.com and has appeared on Fox News. He holds a BS degree in communications, a Masters degree in psychology and is currently a PhD candidate majoring in psychology. He is currently the weekend Motorsports Editor for Autoweek.
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