Grant Enfinger won the Truck Series race at Lime Rock without being the fastest truck there, which he would probably admit if you asked him nicely. It was his first win in more than a season and the first road-course victory of his career, and it did something no run of quiet finishes had managed all year: it dragged him off the playoff bubble and inside the cut. On Saturday at North Wilkesboro, he has to prove it wasn't an accident, and the drivers chasing him could not have picked a better track to do it on.
The short-track kids are right behind him
Enfinger goes to North Wilkesboro ninth in points, 25 clear of Tyler Ankrum in tenth. That is a real cushion and a fragile one at the same time. Everyone from tenth down to fifteenth is bunched inside 34 points, and two of the drivers in that group are short-track specialists arriving at their kind of place.
Brenden "Butterbean" Queen (No. 12, Kaulig Racing), the Rookie-of-the-Year leader, sits 13th, and North Wilkesboro is nearly a home track for him. He won a CARS Tour race here, and he finished fourth in his Truck Series debut at the track in 2024.
"North Wilkesboro is a really special place to me because this is the track that kind of put my name out there after I won in a late model," Queen said. He is aiming to use the two short tracks in the next few weeks to push toward the playoff cut.
Justin Haley (No. 16, Kaulig Racing) sits 15th, on the wrong side of the line, and has his own reason to like the week. He has raced North Wilkesboro in a Cup car, and he was running for a top-10 at Lime Rock before he got wrecked on the last lap.
"Having some experience in a Cup car at North Wilkesboro definitely helps," Haley said. "You get a feel for the track and how it changes, but the trucks drive different." Enfinger's Lime Rock trophy is the only thing standing between a comfortable Saturday and a nervous one.
A different test entirely
Lime Rock is a road course. North Wilkesboro is a 0.625-mile oval with a downhill frontstretch and an uphill backstretch, a short track that rewards the exact skills a road course doesn't: restart aggression, a truck that turns in traffic, and a willingness to lean on the guy beside you. The FaithFest 250 runs 250 laps and 156.25 miles, with stages ending on laps 70 and 140. Chandler Smith won it a year ago and returns to defend. First green flag is 12:30 p.m. Saturday on FS1, the opening act of a doubleheader that hands the track to the Cup Series on Sunday night.
The weekend carries a little history of its own. Ram is back in NASCAR after a 13-year absence, running a rotating cast in the No. 25, and this week the seat goes to Ryan Newman, who won a modified race at North Wilkesboro during the track's 2022 revival. "It's special returning to a brand I had so much success with early in my career," Newman said, "and racing at Wilkesboro is always cool."
Riggs, still in front
None of that bubble math reaches the top of the standings, where Layne Riggs continues to run the series. Riggs leads with 595 points and four wins, 44 ahead of Kaden Honeycutt, and has spent the season making the championship feel settled earlier than it should be. The fight worth watching is further down, where Enfinger is defending a spot from a couple of short-track natives closing fast.
Enfinger got his win the hard way, by outlasting the trucks that were faster than his. Green flag is 12:30 Saturday on FS1, where being fastest is once again the recommended approach.