JOLIET, Ill. – Perseverance paid off for Brandon Jones at Chicagoland (Ill.) Speedway Saturday afternoon.
The Joe Gibbs Racing driver earned just his third top-five finish of the year in the Camping World 300, the first time his No. 19 Toyota Supra has done so in four months in the second race of the season at Atlanta (Ga.) Motor Speedway in late February.
Jones, 22, qualified sixth on the heels of a runner-up performance in Friday night’s NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series Camping World 225 for Kyle Busch Motorsports and used the weekend momentum to carry him to his eighth top-10 finish of the year.
It wasn’t just momentum that carried Jones to one of his strongest performances of the season, the work of crew chief Jeff Meendering to keep Jones’ No. 19 Menards | Bali Toyota balanced throughout the 200-lap aided in assisting Jones kick off a 16-week consecutive stretch for the NASCAR Xfinity Series on a high note.
After finishing fourth in both stages Saturday, Jones attempted to throw his superb performance away following a speeding penalty exiting pit road on Lap 112 following a caution for a spin by Ryan Sieg.
Having to climb back through the field, Jones had muscled his way back inside the top-10 by Lap 150 and made a scheduled green-flag pit stop on Lap 154, but when a caution waved on Lap 172, it bunched the field back together and gave Jones the opportunity to wrestle his way back to the front for a 20-lap shootout.
Despite four tires and fuel to the finish, it took some time for Jones’ race car to come to life but over the final 10 laps of the race, Jones was able to climb from seventh to fifth when the checkered flag waved.
Two hours after the race, Jones was credited with a fourth-place finish after teammate Christopher Bell failed post-race inspection. With Bell’s penalty, Jones became the highest finishing Joe Gibbs Racing driver in the race.
Jones felt he could have finished higher but the speeding penalty and track position proved to be too much to overcome.
“It’s tough. It’s on me,” said Jones. “You can’t speed on pit road if you are going to try to win one of these races. There was two really good guys all day in the race, but I kind of thought we were third-place all race long.”
Attempting to look at the bigger picture, Jones says the team’s ability to capitalize and gain stage points will hopefully carry them back into championship contention.
“All-in-all, this is where we need to be,” added Jones. “We had great stages. Great points day – it’s what we need to do to get back into this thing.”
Following Chicago, Jones remains in Playoff contention and sits 11th overall, 17 points ahead of the cutoff mark held by Ryan Sieg.
Follow Chris Knight on Twitter @Knighter01.
