By Seth Eggert, Staff Writer
MARTINSVILLE, VA – In a race of survival, Timmy Hill maneuvered his way to his first career top-five finish in NASCAR competition.
Shortly after the halfway mark of the NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series NASCAR Hall of Fame 200 at Martinsville Speedway, Hill found himself inside the top-10. He narrowly avoided two separate multi-truck accidents that wiped out several trucks.
On restart after restart, Hill’s No. 56 Southern Freight Services Chevrolet Silverado bounced up and down the running order from fifth to ninth. The NASCAR veteran battled Stewart Friesen, John Hunter Nemechek, and newcomer Danny Bohn.
On the final lap, an incident involving Harrison Burton sent the Kyle Busch Motorsports driver spinning. Hill went wide to avoid the incident and moved up to fifth by the time the checkered flag waved.
“It’s a really good feeling,” Hill explained. “It’s just two of us working in the shop, me, and my crew chief, Greg Eli. We were running the part-time schedule so it’s tough for us to get in the rhythm and keeping things going. But we know when we can, we prepare our trucks really well and I’m really proud about this effort everyone put on today.”
The fifth-place finish is the first for Hill in eight years of NASCAR competition. His previous best finish, sixth, came in the Truck race at Talladega Superspeedway in 2013.
The top-five is also the first for Hill as a team owner. The Hill Motorsports team debuted in the Martinsville Spring race earlier this season. In nine races this season, the organization’s previous best result was 11th at Kentucky Speedway with Tyler Hill behind the wheel.
Hill admitted that the top-five was special in part because the top-five was with his own team.
“It’s really special. I’ll tell you what, it’s really special as my own team as well. So many hours get put in this. I didn’t know how many hours you put in these race teams until I owned my own race team. So, to do it in my own truck, it feels really special.
“All I wanted to do this year is from the top 15. I wanted to have something I could build on for next year. I wanted to run a part-time schedule, get a better understanding of how to run a race team and then go into next year running more races, hoped to run a full-time schedule next year.
“So, we’re checking all of our boxes. I didn’t know it would be this successful so early, but it’s really special and I have really high hopes for things to come.”
Martinsville marked the final scheduled race in the Truck Series for Timmy Hill this year. Tyler Hill will be behind the wheel at the season finale at Homestead-Miami Speedway in three weeks. At ISM Raceway, Carson Hocevar will be in the No. 56 in a partnership with Jordan Anderson Racing as previously announced.