Legacy Motor Club: Las Vegas Race Preview – Speedway Digest

CLUB MINUTES:

JJ AT LAS VEGAS: LEGACY MC owner and seven-time NASCAR Cup Series Champion Jimmie Johnson has an impressive record at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. He owns 23 Cup Series starts at the track that have resulted in four wins, seven top-fives, and 10 top-10s as well as 595 laps led. Johnson won three back-to-back races at Las Vegas in March 2005, March 2006, and March 2007. In 2005, he started ninth, led 107 laps, and bested Las Vegas native Kyle Busch by 1.661 seconds. Johnson followed that up in 2006 when he started third, led the final lap of the race, and bested Matt Kenseth by .045 of a second. He returned once again in 2007 where he started 23rd and bested Jeff Gordon by 2.795 seconds after leading 89 laps. Johnson’s final win in the Cup Series at Las Vegas came in March 2010. He started 20th, led 18 laps and bested runner-up Kevin Harvick by 1.874 seconds. He has two additional starts at Las Vegas in the NASCAR Xfinity Series with a best finish of 14th in March 2001.

KENSETH LAS VEGAS STATS: LEGACY MC competition advisor and 2003 NASCAR Cup Series Champion Matt Kenseth owns 19 Cup Series starts at Las Vegas. In these starts, he’s collected three victories, six top-fives, and 10 top-10s in addition to 526 laps led. He scored his first win in March 2003 when he started 17th, led 88 laps, and bested Dale Earnhardt Jr. by 9.104 seconds. He followed that up the next year in March 2004 when he started 25th, led 123 laps, and beat Kasey Kahne by 3.426 seconds. Kenseth’s final win at Las Vegas came in March 2013. He started 18th, led 42 laps, and bested Kahne once again by .594 of a second. Kenseth has an additional 10 starts in the NASCAR Xfinity Series at Las Vegas where he earned a best result of second from the pole in March 2006.

LEGACY MOTOR CLUB AT VEGAS: Since 2023, LEGACY MC has competed in five races at Las Vegas Motor Speedway with five drivers: Erik Jones, John Hunter Nemechek, Jimmie Johnson, Carson Hocevar and Noah Gragson. The team’s best starting position was 20th, achieved by Nemechek in March, while its best finish also came from Nemechek, who secured ninth place in the Oct. 2024 race.

CAL WELLS TURNS 70: On Friday, Oct. 10, LEGACY MC Chief Executive Officer Cal Wells III will celebrate his 70th birthday. Wells has had a long and successful career in motorsports since he started at Precision Preparation, Inc. in 1979, specifically the NASCAR Cup Series and with Toyota. He was appointed CEO at LEGACY MC in July 2023.

LEGACY MC LAS VEGAS TAKEOVER: Prior to the race weekend, LEGACY MC drivers Erik Jones and John Hunter Nemechek will head over to the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) Apex on Friday just off the Las Vegas Strip to participate in a training session with UFC legend Forrest Griffin and several training fighters. The duo will get a tour of the facility, train with Forrest, and watch some sparing between fighters who are training for an upcoming event.

Following their visit to the UFC, Jones and Nemechek will serve as the grand marshals for the hauler parade at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. They’ll lead the way in a Toyota Camry as the haulers make their way inside the track on Friday.

OLIPOP, SPONGEBOB, AND BAYNE: LEGACY MC ambassador and 2011 Daytona 500 winner Trevor Bayne will make his return to the NASCAR Xfinity Series in Saturday night’s race at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. Piloting the No. 24 Olipop x SpongeBob Movie Toyota GR Supra for Sam Hunt Racing, Bayne will make his first start in the series since 2023 in collaboration with LEGACY MC team partner Olipop.

In a collaboration with the upcoming release of The SpongeBob Movie on Dec. 19, Olipop released a “Pineapple Paradise” flavor with the beloved childhood cartoon character’s face adorning the can, similar to how it’ll look on Bayne’s car this weekend. With five different styles of cans, Soda Lovers can collect them all and enter points to win prizes at DrinkOlipop.com.

NEVER SETTLE: Join ESPN’s Marty Smith and LEGACY MOTOR CLUB’s owner Jimmie Johnson for their weekly podcast, “Never Settle”. Fans can find the podcast on YouTube. Tune into Never Settle on YouTube and watch the behind the scenes clips as well as full episodes. Click HERE to watch and subscribe.
JOHN HUNTER NEMECHEK
NO. 42 PYE-BARKER FIRE & SAFETY TOYOTA CAMRY XSE

JHN AT LAS VEGAS: John Hunter Nemechek has five NASCAR Cup Series starts at Las Vegas, with his highest finish at the track of ninth coming from last year’s fall race. In the NASCAR Xfinity Series, Nemechek has made seven starts, including one race win in March 2024, and only finished outside the top-10 twice. In his 10 starts in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series, he earned two pole awards and a race win in March 2021.

WINNER AT LAS VEGAS: Nemechek won the NASCAR Xfinity Series race at Las Vegas in March 2024, where he led 99 laps and won with a margin of victory of 4.36 seconds over Cole Custer. In the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series, he took home the checkered flag in March 2021 where he led 94 of 134 laps and won with a margin of victory of 0.686 of a second over Kyle Busch.

T-MACK LAS VEGAS STATS: Sunday’s race will be crew chief Travis Mack’s 10th NASCAR Cup Series race at Las Vegas. His first outing came in 2018 with Kasey Kahne. Mack returned to Las Vegas with Daniel Suárez in the 2021 season. The duo competed in six races together through the end of 2023 and earned a highest finish of 10th in March 2023. In 2024, Mack competed with Derek Kraus in the March race. He then returned in March 2025 with John Hunter Nemechek. In the NASCAR Xfinity Series, Mack has five starts with Michael Annett, where the pair earned three top-10 finishes. They earned a best finish of fifth in March 2019.

LAS VEGAS LIGHTS: On Thursday afternoon, John Hunter Nemechek and LEGACY MC Ambassador Trevor Bayne will visit the facilities of United Soccer League (USL) team the Las Vegas Lights. Together, they’ll tour Cashman Stadium and interact with some of the Lights players. Fans can follow along with the collaboration on social media.

JOHN HUNTER NEMECHEK QUOTE:
“We’ve been seeing progress in our mile-and-a-half program all year, so I’m excited to see what we can do in Las Vegas. I’ve had success at this track in other series in the past, so I’m feeling confident heading into the weekend.”

TRAVIS MACK QUOTE:
“We’re ready to keep building on our mile-and-a-half program. We’ve been showing speed all year, and I think we have a top-five car if we can execute the way I know we can. I’m really looking forward to Vegas.”

ERIK JONES
NO. 43 DOLLAR TREE TOYOTA CAMRY XSE

JONES LAS VEGAS STATS: Sunday’s Las Vegas 400 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway will mark Erik Jones’ 17th NASCAR Cup Series start at the 1.5-mile oval in the desert. Through these starts, he’s collected four top-10 finishes with a best result of eighth, earned three-times in his career. The first came in March 2018 when Jones started ninth. He then followed that up in Sept. 2020 after starting 13th. Finally, he finished eighth in Oct. 2022 after starting 22nd. Additionally, Jones has four starts outside of the Cup Series at Las Vegas – two in the NASCAR Xfinity Series and two in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series. He earned a best finish of third in the Xfinity Series after starting second in March 2016. Jones never finished outside the top-10 at Las Vegas in the Truck Series with a win in Sept. 2014 and a ninth-place finish in Oct. 2015.

TRUCK SERIES WINNER AT LAS VEGAS: Jones is a winner at Las Vegas Motor Speedway in his NASCAR career. In Sept. 2014 when Jones was running a part-time schedule in the Craftsman Truck Series, he started 13th in the No. 51 Truck for Kyle Busch Motorsports. He led twice for 19 laps in the race, first leading for five laps on Lap 27 before taking the lead for the final time on Lap 133. He bested runner-up Bubba Wallce by 1.329 seconds to earn his second of three victories in a season where he ran just 12 races.

BESHORE AT LAS VEGAS: Crew chief Ben Beshore has seven starts on top of the box at Las Vegas Motor Speedway in the NASCAR Cup Series with three drivers – Las Vegas native Kyle Busch, John Hunter Nemechek and Jones. He has four top-fives and four top-10s with 51 laps led by Busch. He earned a best finish of third on three separate occasions with Busch in March 2021, Sept. 2021, and Oct. 2022. Beshore has an additional six races in the NASCAR Xfinity Series with Busch, Las Vegas native Riley Herbst, Harrison Burton, and John Hunter Nemechek. He never finished outside the top-10 in the Xfinity Series at Las Vegas. He won with Busch in March 2019 after the duo started eighth and led 98 laps.

ERIK JONES QUOTE
“Las Vegas should be a good one for us. Our mile-and-a-half program has been our strongest one this season, and I think we’ve shown up and had speed at a good bit of those tracks. It’ll be nice to go there after last weekend’s race and see what we’ve got. Hopefully we can put it all together and come home with a strong result from this race.”

BEN BESHORE QUOTE
“Typically, the weather is a little warmer in the Fall Las Vegas race rather than the Spring. That can make for a little bit different style of racing. You’re going to see guys moving around a lot more because of the lower grip on the track. On top of that, the new tire that was at Kansas a few weeks ago, and will be used this weekend, seems to be down on grip as well from the previous Kansas race. We’re just trying to factor all of that in, and I think you’ll see a race where guys are moving around a lot from bottom to middle to top. There should be a lot of passing, and it should be a really fun race.”

CLUB APPEARANCES:

On Thursday, Oct. 9, John Hunter Nemechek and Trevor Bayne will be doing an Olipop sampling at the Circle K on Craig Rd (555 E Craig Rd., North Las Vegas, NV 89030) at 2 p.m. local time.

On Friday, Oct. 10, Nemechek will join Danielle Trotta and Larry McReynolds on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio (Channel 90) at 10:15 a.m. ET. Erik Jones will then call in with them on SiriusXM’s On Track at 10:30 a.m. ET.

On Saturday, Oct. 11, Jones and Nemechek will then head out to the NASCAR Classics trackside merchandise rig at 10:45 a.m. local time for a joint autograph session.

Finally on Sunday, Oct. 12, Jones will also make an appearance at the Toyota Gazoo Racing Experience pit box in the fan zone for a Q&A session at 10:30 a.m. local time.
TUNE IN:

Fans can tune in to watch the Las Vegas 400 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway on Sunday, Oct. 12 at 5:30 p.m. ET on USA, MAX, PRN, and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio (Channel 90).

LMC PR