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\t\t<\/p>\nLAS VEGAS \u2014 The first NASCAR Cup Series win is seemingly right around the corner for Ty Gibbs now that, in his words, he has the right people around him.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re working with the right people so that shows a lot and that\u2019s why we\u2019re running really great. They believe in me and are really loyal people and that\u2019s important in racing and we\u2019ve been running well,\u201d Gibbs said.<\/p>\n
After finishing fourth at Phoenix Raceway and having one of his closest calls with victory lane in the Cup Series, Gibbs spoke with bold confidence and offered what could be perceived as a jab at former competition director Chris Gabehart. In a lawsuit Joe Gibbs Racing filed against Gabehart, his frustrations with the young driver came to light. <\/p>\n
For someone who compared himself to a certain deity, saying that deity also had haters, having a \u201chater\u201d may be just the fuel he needs \u2014 and the stats agree. <\/p>\n
Gibbs\u2019 fourth-place finish was his second consecutive top-five finish \u2014 a feat he has only accomplished two other times in his career but never since 2024. In getting there, he put up a strong restart against one of the two best cars all day before falling a couple of laps later.<\/p>\n
Although Gibbs didn\u2019t win, his performance put him in Chase contention \u2014 in 15th in points, three points above the cutline. More broadly on the season, he is one of two drivers who has finished inside of the top-five in both of the non-drafting track races this season.<\/p>\n
The other? Teammate Christopher Bell, who led the most laps at Phoenix.<\/p>\n
Just between Gibbs and Bell, Joe Gibbs Racing is hot right now but all four cars ran well at Phoenix. Denny Hamlin has also finished inside the top-10 in both non-drafting track races and Chase Briscoe had a top-five car before finding issues in those races.<\/p>\n
Now, they\u2019re heading to Las Vegas, where Hamlin and Briscoe contended for the win in the fall and Bell has run well there before.<\/p>\n
While Gibbs has an average finish of 24.1 at the 1.5-mile oval, that doesn\u2019t tell the whole story.<\/p>\n
In three of the last four Vegas Cup races, Gibbs has earned at least five stage points. The first instance was in spring of 2024 when he finished fifth after earning five points in the first stage.<\/p>\n
Much like Phoenix, the stats didn\u2019t look good on the surface for Gibbs at Las Vegas but he still ran a good race and had a good finish.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe were really good with 8-10 races to go last year just didn\u2019t really finish well,\u201d Gibbs said, \u201cbut now I can really race and we\u2019ve been fast all year.\u201d<\/p>\n
With the possibility of Chevrolet being behind with a new body and having won or dominated the last two Cup intermediate races, Toyota is bringing all the right ingredients to Las Vegas to cook up a slice of Heaven that could make Hell\u2019s Kitchen chefs jealous.<\/p>\n
And Ty Gibbs could be the guy to serve that to the field.<\/p>\n
If Gibbs can win, he\u2019ll snap a 127-race winless streak in the NASCAR Cup Series \u2014 one of the longest of any driver in the field. Ty Dillon leads all active drivers for most Cup races without a win (285). <\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
Jonathan Fjeld is the co-owner of the The Racing Experts, LLC. He has been with TRE since 2010.<\/p>\n
A Twin Valley, MN, native, Fjeld became a motorsports fan at just three years old (first race was the 2002 Pennsylvania 500). He worked as a contributor and writer for TRE from 2010-18. Since then, he has stepped up and covered 24 NASCAR race weekends and taken on a larger role with TRE. He became the co-owner and managing editor in 2023 and has guided the site to massive growth in that time.<\/p>\n
Fjeld has covered a wide array of stories and moments over the years, including Kevin Harvick’s final Cup Series season, the first NASCAR national series disqualification in over 50 years, Shane van Gisbergen’s stunning win in Chicago and the first Cup Series race at Road America in 66 years \u2013 as well as up-and-coming drivers’ stories and stories from inside the sport, like the tech it takes for Hendrick Motorsports to remain a top-tier team.<\/p>\n
Currently, he resides in Albuquerque, N.M., where he works for KOB 4, an NBC station. He works as a digital producer and does on-air reports. He loves spending time with friends and family, playing and listening to music, exploring new places, being outdoors, reading books and writing among other activities. You can email him at fjeldjonathan@gmail.com<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LAS VEGAS \u2014 The first NASCAR Cup Series win is seemingly right around the corner for Ty Gibbs…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":532982,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[446],"tags":[49,48,634,82],"class_list":["post-532981","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nascar","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-nascar","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/532981","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=532981"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/532981\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/532982"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=532981"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=532981"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=532981"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}