Jake Garcia Plays Spoiler with First Win at Bristol

Jake Garcia won the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race at Bristol Motor Speedway on Thursday, securing his first career victory in his 94th career start. The No. 98 ThorSport Racing team capitalized on the misfortune of several top Chase contenders in the race’s final stage to seize the night.

ThorSport Racing as a whole entered Thursday’s race winless since Ty Majeski took the 2024 season finale. Though former champions Majeski and Ben Rhodes are currently working to bring ThorSport back to the pinnacle of the Craftsman Truck Series, it was Jake Garcia who broke the team’s long winless streak.

“We had a good strategy that helped us come from the back, get some track position and start Stage 3 from the lead” Garcia said. “We had some adversity on that last restart, but fortunately the truck was fast enough to overcome that.”

Top-Five Finishers

Thursday’s second place finisher, Bayley Currey, is himself a winless Truck Series veteran. Driving the No. 5 Tricon Garage Toyota Tundra, Currey had neither the pace nor the time to run down Garcia. Still, he earned the best finish of his career in his first NASCAR national series start of 2026.

Stewart Friesen finished third after falling behind Garcia on the final restart. Justin Haley placed fourth, giving Kaulig Racing the first top-five of their inaugural year with Ram. 16-year-old Tristan McKee followed in fifth, becoming the youngest driver to earn a top-five in Truck Series history.

Chase Outlook

Points leader Layne Riggs finished a disappointing 32nd, dropping him to just three points up in the standings. He initially made an unscheduled stop on Lap 160 for a loose wheel, leaving him two laps off the pace. As the laps ticked down, Riggs’s No. 34 Ford F-150 sustained heavy damage trapping him on pit road for several more crucial laps.

“I guess the No. 1 [of Nick Leitz] just lost talent and wrecked,” Riggs said. “I don’t really know what happened there. It’s probably one of the top three hardest hits of my life. I can’t believe the truck was still rolling after that. I feel like we had the truck to beat. This one stings really bad.”

Kaden Honeycutt finished eighth, drawing closer than ever to Riggs in points. Chandler Smith is now third at 30 points back, with Ty Majeski jumping two spots to fourth after a ninth-place run. He sits 35 points behind Riggs. Had Riggs not swept the race’s two stages for the maximum 20 points, he’d likely be leaving Bristol at an unexpected deficit.

Race Results