AVONDALE, Ariz.
Region: Phoenix · Phoenix Raceway, Avondale
The race at Phoenix Raceway on Friday night turned, as so many races at this one-mile desert oval do, on a pit stop. For two stages, Ty Majeski looked like the driver to beat. He won Stage 1. He won Stage 2. Then the field came down pit road at the second stage break, Kaden Honeycutt's crew sent him back out in the strongest position of any Chase driver, and the rest of the evening belonged to the No. 11.
Honeycutt won the Zero Carbon Bioethanol 150 Powered by POET, the 150-lap NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race that opened the weekend at Phoenix Raceway in Avondale. He led a race-high 53 laps, and every one of them came during the final green-flag run. Once he got in front on the Lap 99 restart, nobody got him back. He crossed the line 1.556 seconds ahead of Christian Eckes, with Layne Riggs in third.
The Stop That Changed the Race
Coming out of that final pit stop, Honeycutt was second overall and, more importantly, first among the Chase contenders. That distinction mattered because the overall lead briefly belonged to Stewart Friesen, who had gambled on two tires while others took four and jumped 12 spots in the process. It was a bold call, and for a restart or two it put Friesen in clean air at the front of the field.
Clean air on two older tires, though, is a loan that comes due quickly at Phoenix. On the Lap 99 restart, Honeycutt got past Friesen and took the lead for good. From there, the story was management: hitting his marks through the dogleg, working traffic without giving Eckes a run, and keeping enough truck underneath him for the closing laps. A margin of more than a second and a half at the checkered flag tells the tale of a final run that was controlled rather than desperate.
After the race, Honeycutt gave the credit where Friday night's result said it belonged: to the crew that won the race on pit road. Winners often thank their teams as a matter of routine. This time the praise was specific and earned, because without that stop there is no track position, no clean restart lane, and very likely no win. For more from the national scene, see our sports section and the latest news from the desk.
A Fourth Win, All in One Season
The numbers behind the win give it extra weight. Honeycutt is 23 years old and from Willow Park, Texas. This was his first victory at Phoenix, and the fourth win of his career — and all four have come this season. That is not a driver stealing a race on a lucky caution. That is a driver and a team that have found something repeatable, at different points in the year, and then brought it to a Chase race in the desert and executed again.
There is also a neat piece of Phoenix history in the truck itself. Honeycutt won in the No. 11 Safelite Toyota for TRICON Garage — the same No. 11 ride in which Corey Heim won the Truck Series championship at this track last year. The number, the team and the building already had a title attached to them before Friday. Honeycutt's win does not add a championship, at least not yet, but it does keep that story moving in the same direction, with the same truck number out front at the same raceway.
On the pit box, the win added to a remarkable career total. Crew chief Scott Zipadelli now has 39 Truck Series victories. That leaves him five short of the all-time series lead held by Eric Phillips. Milestones like that tend to sneak up on people because crew chiefs do their work in increments — one stop, one adjustment, one race at a time. Friday was a good example of why the total keeps climbing: the decisive moment of the race happened in his pit stall.
What the Standings Say Now
With four of the seven Chase races complete, Honeycutt sits on 2,323 points. His lead over Riggs, the closest pursuer, is now 39 points — a useful cushion, though not a safe one with three races still to run. Riggs is second on 2,284 points after his third-place finish, a result that limited the damage on a night when the winner was also the points leader.
Behind them, the order tightens up considerably. Eckes, Friday's runner-up, is third on 2,211 points. Chandler Smith follows on 2,206, then Ty Majeski on 2,188, Daniel Hemric on 2,175 and Gio Ruggiero on 2,172. In other words, behind the top two there is a pack separated by handfuls of points, where one bad afternoon reshuffles everything. Majeski's evening is the clearest illustration: two stage wins showed real speed, but the final result and the points that came with it did not match the early promise.
That spread is why Friday mattered beyond the trophy. A win by the points leader does double work — it banks the victory and it denies the same points swing to everyone chasing him. Riggs drove well enough to stay within reach. Eckes' second place kept him as the best of the rest. But nobody left Avondale closer to Honeycutt than they arrived, and that is exactly the outcome a leader wants with the calendar turning toward the stretch run.
Next Stop: Talladega
The Chase continues next week at Talladega, a very different kind of test from Phoenix. Where Avondale rewards track position, pit execution and a truck that stays consistent through a long green run, Talladega is famous for packs, drafts and outcomes that can flip in the final few hundred yards. A 39-point lead affords Honeycutt some room, but no lead feels comfortable at a superspeedway, and his rivals know that one chaotic afternoon can erase a month of careful work.
For one night in the desert, though, there was nothing chaotic about the result. The fastest late-race truck, the best final stop and the steadiest closing run all belonged to the same team. Honeycutt and TRICON Garage came to Phoenix in the same No. 11 that celebrated a title here a year ago, and they left with a win, a bigger points lead, and the rest of the Chase field looking up at them. Readers following the weekend in the Valley can also catch up with our coverage of the Golden Knights win earlier this week in the sports pages.
