KANSAS CITY, Kan. – AM Racing has been the little engine that could all year long.
Kansas Speedway was exceptional to that fact.
For the Kansas Lottery 300, Brett Moffitt qualified 10th, kept the fenders on, stayed in the top 10 virtually all race long, and finished seventh to earn the team’s eighth top 10 through 26 races.
“Six to eight weeks ago, we were on string of top 10 finishes and really hitting our stride,” Moffitt shared. “And then, we just we hit a bad spell. We had five races we were closing in on the points of making the playoffs the natural way and just had like six bad weeks in a row. Whether it was a parts failure at Watkins Glen, most of it wasn’t due to lack of speed in the car. It was just other situations that were out of our control.
“Last weekend at Darlington, we missed it. We were looking forward to that track. We’re really good there in the spring, but we rebounded here at Kansas and had a really fast Concrete Supply Ford Mustang. But yeah, it’s been fun. We wanted to make the playoffs so a little bit of a bummer we didn’t, but at least we came here to Kansas and ran inside the top 10 all day for most of the day, competed with the big teams and showed them we were here.”
The race started with three cautions in the first 20 laps, including the first yellow waving before the leaders could even get into Turn 1. More yellows and chaos ensued the following stage including Playoff contender Brandon Jones. But the last 50 laps stayed green and clean, which stretched some in the field on fuel.
We came here to Kansas, ran inside the top 10 all day for most of the day, competed with the big teams and showed them we were here.
Moffitt wasn’t fazed by the long run.
“This place goes green a lot,” he stated. “I was hoping for a late race caution because we were still lead lap and there were a lot of cars lapped down. I think we’d all come in and get our tires and it’s hard to tell at that point whether you go forward or backwards but need to win. I wanted the opportunity to try at least.”
While the 2018 NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series champion won’t be on the hunt for another NASCAR title, he still has goals to achieve throughout the remainder of the 2023 season.
“t’s just about building,” said Moffitt. “This whole year has been about building. It’s a new team and their first year in the Xfinity Series, all new people, you know, we continue to build a notebook, continue to build more speed, to build more consistency. Our goal shifts now to 13th in points. That’s our ceiling from here on out and we got to do whatever we can execute the last seven races or whatever we got now and make it happen.”
So where does he hope to accomplish that?
Everywhere.
“All of them are really pretty good for us in the Playoffs.”
