SPEEDWAY, Ind. — While it wasn’t a victory, Cole Custer’s debut at the famed 2.5-mile Indianapolis Motor Speedway was solid.
From the moment his Stewart-Haas Racing team unloaded their No. 00 Haas Automation Ford on Friday, Custer, a Haas Racing development driver showed that he had a car capable of competing.
The speed carried over to Saturday afternoon where despite dealing with brutal temperatures, Custer’s Ford qualified a solid sixth, his best showing since a third at Pocono Raceway in June.
Although not a factor for the race win on Saturday afternoon, Custer hovered inside the top-10 for much of the race picking up crucial stage points in Stage 1 – then opting to pit before the end of Stage 2 to set the tone for the third and final stage.
Wrestling XFINITY Series regulars Ryan Reed and Brennan Poole, Custer kept them at bay to earn his eighth top-10 finish of the year and second in a row.
“It was a pretty fun race, said Custer. “A lot of the time we were kind of strung out there, but when you could get a push and everything it was awesome to get locked up going down the straightaways and everything. Our Haas Automation Mustang was pretty good today.
“I think we were just as good as the leaders, but I had some bad restarts there at the end. I wasn’t really proud of that, but I was happy with it. We got a solid run and we’ll go to Iowa and hopefully improve on our last run.”
The finish kept Custer sixth in the championship standings ahead of next Saturday afternoon’s standalone race at Iowa Speedway, where he finished 24th after many the major players were trapped a lap down during late race pit strategy.
Follow Chris Knight on Twitter @Knighter01.
