Ryan Preece had waited his whole career for a chance to race in a car as strong as the No. 20 Toyota of Joe Gibbs Racing.
Preece then went out and proved what he could do with top-notch equipment.
The 26-year-old Preece survived a green-white-checkered finish to win the NASCAR Xfinity race Saturday at Iowa Speedway in Newton, Iowa for his first career victory.
Preece, running the second of a two-race deal with the powerhouse JGR team, started from the pole and held off Kyle Benjamin on three restarts in the final 17 laps.
Preece, the Connecticut driver who is a regular in the lower-division NASCAR Whelen Modified series, crossed the start-finish line less than a car-length ahead of Benjamin.
“To be honest with you, I believed in myself enough to do it,” Preece said of using his Xfinity budget for just two races. “It is very risky. I had multiple people in the business tell me that it was a little (riskier) than they would do.”
The 19-year-old Benjamin was a career-best second, followed by Brian Scott, Brennan Poole and rookie Cole Custer.
William Byron, who began a streak of three wins in five races at Iowa last month, finished ninth and Justin Allgaier was 20th after leading 106 laps.
Preece finished 17th in the series a year ago, with only one top-10 in 33 starts.
IndyCar
Will Power, still looking for a victory at the Mid-Ohio Sport Car Course in Lexington, Ohio took his fifth pole of the season and fellow Team Penske driver Josef Newgarden qualified second for Sunday’s Honda Indy 200.
For Power, it was his third pole at Mid-Ohio and the 49th of his career to tie Bobby Unser for fourth among IndyCar drivers. Power has also been on the front row at Mid-Ohio for six straight years.
In eight starts at Mid-Ohio, his best finish is second, with five other top-five finishes.
“We haven’t won here,” he said. “It’s something I’d really like to do. I’ve qualified well here. I’ve run well here.”
Power won the Fast 6 qualifier Saturday with a lap of 126.672 mph compared to 126.407 for Newgarden as Chevrolet took the top two spots.
Team Penske earned both of the spots on the front row for the fifth time in 13 races this season.
“We’re in the front row with Team Penske so it’s a good team day,” Newgarden said.
Takuma Sato of Andretti Autosport drove his Honda to the third position. Local favorite Graham Rahal (Honda) of Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing was fourth.
Helio Castroneves (Chevrolet) of Team Penske qualified fifth and five-time Mid-Ohio winner Scott Dixon (Honda) was sixth for Chip Ganassi Racing. Dixon is the only driver to make the Fast 6 in the seven races in which the qualifying format is used.
NASCAR Trucks
Christopher Bell grabbed a late lead and held on to win the Truck Series race at Pocono Raceway in Long Pond, Pennsylvania.
Bell passed John Hunter Nemechek and held off Ben Rhodes over the final two laps to win for the fourth time this season. Bell crashed out of one race but hasn’t otherwise finished worse than ninth in 12 races this season.
Rhodes was second, followed by Ryan Truex, Nemechek and Johnny Sauter.
The 22-year-old Bell leads the series in wins, poles, playoff points, laps led and top-10 finishes in the No. 4 Toyota for Kyle Busch Motorsports.
Busch led most of the race until he made contact with Justin Haley and spun into the outside wall. Haley blamed himself for the wreck.