BRISTOL, Tenn: The finish was worth the wait.
A week after finishing a miserable 39th at Atlanta (Ga.) Motor Speedway, Raphael Lessard recovered brilliantly with a top-five finish in the postponed Pinty’s Truck Race on Dirt at Bristol (Tenn.) Motor Speedway on Monday afternoon.
Lessard started deep in the field and even had to deal with overheating issues early into the 150-lap event, but as the race settled, Lessard moved forward and utilized the bottom lane to get there.
By the end of Stage 1, Lessard finished 15th. Throughout Stage 2, Lessard hustled and gained seven spots to claim eighth.
Stage 3, the track and truck continued to play into the hands of the 2020 Talladega Superspeedway Truck Series winner and he muscled to sixth just outside fifty laps to go.
Inside the final 40 laps of the race, Lessard utilizing all three lanes of the race track picked up two more positions to fourth where he maintained until the third and final red flag waved with 13 laps to go.
On the final restart, Lessard was able to soar to third and fall into the clutches of leaders Martin Truex Jr. and Ben Rhodes but ran out of laps to contend for his second NASCAR Camping World Truck Series victory.
Still, Lessard climbed from his No. 24 Chevy Accessories Chevrolet Silverado ecstatic with his finish — feeling like he had won.
“First of all, I’d like to thank everyone at GMS (Racing),” said Lessard. “It was a blast. I had so much fun. Coming from the back, it was pretty hard to pass, and you had to wait for people to make a mistake, but I loved it.”
Lessard noted later in the race, the bottom lane didn’t work as well as it did earlier in the race – when track conditions were ideal. Still, knowing he had a truck capable of running in multiple lanes aided him in his progression forward.
“Slipping and sliding like that, it was a lot of fun,” he explained. “I just couldn’t get it to turn on the bottom like I was earlier in the race, but oh well. We’ll just move on.”
Bristol certainly was a boost to what has been a disastrous start to his sophomore Truck Series season for the St.-Joseph de Beauce, Quebec Canada native.
Through the first four races of the year, the 19-year-old had only managed a 29th place average finish, but after his fourth career Truck Series top-five, Lessard not only improved that average finishing position by more than five spots, but also jumped four positions in the championship standings from 18th to 14th.
“It’s good finally to get a good finish,” added Lessard. “It’s been a rough beginning of the season, we didn’t finish like we wanted, but I’m happy with a top-three.”
Follow Chris Knight on Twitter @Knighter01.[table=3598]
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