Texas II: Jason White race report

Jason White Leaves Texas Disappointed

Fort Worth, TX -- November 5, 2010. Jason White was confident before the start of the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series Winstar World Casino 350k that his GunBroker.com/Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation Toyota was heading toward a top-five finish at the Texas Motor Speedway, but an unfortunate penalty dropped him to the tail of the field. White would recover to finish eleventh and hold onto tenth in the standings with two races remaining in the 2010 season.

White qualified the GunBroker.com/RMEF Toyota fourteenth on Thursday evening with a lap of 30.35 seconds at nearly 180 mph placing the No. 23 on the outside of the seventh row for the start of the 147-lap race.

Jason took advantage of Johanna Long's misfortunes on the first lap using his position in the outside lane to move up to ninth when the yellow flag flew at the end of the first lap and would power his way up to eighth place when the second caution would fly on lap forty-one.

White returned to the track in seventh position following a great pit stop by the SS Green Light team, but NASCAR officials ruled that a team member crossed the pit wall to early when he accidentally slipped while waiting for White's Gunbroker.com/RMEF Toyota to enter the pit area. The penalty would leave Jason with a lot of work to recover as he fell to twenty-second place with one hundred laps remaining in the race. Crew Chief Doug Howe called Jason in to top-off with Sunoco racing gas before the green flew.

The third caution would fly on lap fifty-two Jason nearly was caught up in a wreck involving three other trucks directly in front of him. Jason made an evasive move to the inside and then quickly to the outside to avoid the spinning trucks. Following the track clean up he would restart seventeenth.

By lap sixty, Jason disposed of two more competitors and he moved the No. 23 into the top-fifteen and by the sixty-fifth lap he was knocking the door of the top-ten running lap times amongst the quickest on the track. Jason would catch teammate David Starr on lap sixty-six and the two would battle for the tenth spot for over three laps before White finally pulled ahead.

The extra few laps of fuel from the second caution would pay off for the GunBroker.com/RMEF team as Jason was able to stay on the track while the leaders pit in front of him and he would lead several laps before making his final stop on lap 103. When the pit stops cycled, Jason found himself directly behind the leaders one lap down, but in a favorable position for the lucky-dog pass if the caution would fly.

The SS Green Light teams wishes came through on lap 122 when the races final caution flew placing White back on the lead lap. The team bolted up the last set of tires for the stretch run with Jason hoping to rebound for a top-ten finish, but the truck was too tight for Jason to make a move finishing a disappointing eleventh place behind winner Kyle Busch.

"It's just a shame that we didn't get a top-ten tonight," a dejected White said following the race. "We were fast enough through the middle of the race, but it's just so hard to come all the way through the field. Track position is so important on these mile and a half tracks. I really thought we would be able to grab a couple spots at the end of the race, but the last set of tires was not as good as the first couple and I was just too tight to get back into the top-ten."

"On the positive note the truck is in good shape, there is no damage and we are learning things that will help us get better as a team. It's only our second race in a Toyota, so there is a lot to learn."

Jason holds tenth place in the NCWTS point standings behind leader Todd Bodine with two races remaining. He is now seventy points ahead of Ricky Carmichael.

-source: ssglr