Ruggiero Takes First Career Truck Win With Help From Heim; Results

John K Harrelson | Lumen Digital Agency for Toyota GAZOO Racing

Gio Ruggiero captured his first career NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series victory with help from his TRICON Garage teammate Corey Heim in a closing-lap duel against Spire Motorsports teammates Corey LaJoie and Rajah Caruth.

“It feels great. It’s a great accomplishment," Ruggiero said of the win. "We’ve been working so hard at this all year, and to win in my rookie season like this is awesome, especially with the last couple of weeks with the top-fives and top-threes that we’ve had. I think we can have a good end to our season and have a good chance to win at Martinsville or Phoenix.”

After the Spire duo fizzled as they got crossed up on the exit of Turn 4, Heim, who has collected an NASCAR Truck Series all-time record 10 wins this season, never left the rear bumper of his 19-year-old teammate in a march to the finish line.

The youngster from Seekonk, MA, was very thankful for Heim's help throughout Friday's race.

“Yeah, it was great. [Corey Heim] did a great job all day helping me. He was the best pusher, and I was really happy when he was behind me for sure. I knew I had a good shot there at the end," Ruggiero said. "I just didn’t want to let our group down. We had such a fast truck, and I know a superspeedway can be a bit of a wild card race sometimes, but I feel like truckwise we dominated this one.”

Ruggiero, the leading Rookie of the Year contender this year, held on to take the victory by a margin of 0.059 seconds. With the win, Ruggiero becomes the first driver to record a victory behind the wheel of a TRICON Garage, aside from Heim, since the company rebranded from DGR-Crosley heading into the 2022 season.

The win, in a race where Ruggiero started from the pole, comes in the young driver's 23rd career start.

Ty Majeski, who nearly saw his position in the Playoff standings sink on Friday afternoon, was able to rebound from an early crash on Lap 4 to finish third, which minimized the damage incurred on the day. Majeski will exit Talladega just five points below the cutline heading into the final race of the Round of 8 at Martinsville Speedway.

Dawson Sutton, one of Ruggiero's fellow rookie competitors, would secure a solid fourth-place finish, while Playoff contender Layne Riggs would come back from a pair of incidents to finish fifth. It was a rough day overall for Riggs, who was unable to turn a lap in qualifying due to an unapproved adjustment found on his No. 34 Front Row Motorsports Ford F-150 following pre-race inspection.

While Riggs fought hard to end the day, he remains below the Playoff cutline, mostly due to missing out on Stage Points due to the incidents. He now sits six points below the cutline heading into next weekend's event at Martinsville.

Tyler Ankrum (Playoff contender), Matt Crafton, Corey LaJoie, Rajah Caruth (Playoff contender), and Kaden Honeycutt (Playoff contender) rounded out the top-10 finishers in the race.

While Caruth was unable to shove LaJoie to victory, and they faded to finishes of eighth and ninth when they became disconnected, Caruth bolstered his Championship 4 hopes on a day, where he collected his first Stage win of the season in Stage 1, and captured a third-place finish in Stage 2.

Caruth rocketed to second in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series Playoff standings.

While it was a good day for some of the Playoff contenders, and a rally finish for some others, it was a horrendous points day for two of the championship hopefuls.

Daniel Hemric suffered a cut tire and massive damage around the mid-way point of the event, and would finish 34th, while Grant Enfinger would see his day end in a crash on Lap 4 after an errant shove from Chandler Smith. Enfinger would be credited with a 36th-place result.

Here are the results from Friday's NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series Love's RV Stop 225 at Talladega Superspeedway:

Fin	Truck	Driver	Laps	Diff
1	17	Gio Ruggiero (S2) #	90	--
2	11	Corey Heim (P)	90	0.059
3	98	Ty Majeski (P)	90	0.185
4	26	Dawson Sutton #	90	0.218
5	34	Layne Riggs (P)	90	0.320
6	18	Tyler Ankrum (P)	90	0.374
7	88	Matt Crafton	90	0.389
8	77	Corey LaJoie	90	0.398
9	71	Rajah Caruth (P) (S2)	90	0.445
10	52	Kaden Honeycutt (P)	90	0.469
11	16	Kris Wright (i)	90	0.474
12	15	Tanner Gray	90	0.475
13	7	JJ Yeley (i)	90	0.595
14	81	Connor Mosack #	90	0.604
15	76	Spencer Boyd	90	0.665
16	99	Ben Rhodes (X)	90	0.688
17	44	Andres Perez de Lara #	90	0.706
18	02	Nathan Byrd	90	0.780
19	42	Matt Mills	90	0.840
20	33	Frankie Muniz #	90	0.872
21	91	Jack Wood	90	0.928
22	38	Chandler Smith	90	1.631
23	66	Luke Fenhaus	90	5.244
24	2	Josh Reaume	89	1 lap
25	35	Greg Van Alst	88	2 laps
26	75	Parker Kligerman	87	3 laps
27	69	Tyler Tomassi (i)	87	3 laps
28	1	Bret Holmes	87	3 laps
29	13	Jake Garcia	87	3 laps
30	22	Jason White	83	Out
31	45	Bayley Currey	68	Out
32	6	Norm Benning	55	Out
33	5	Toni Breidinger #	54	Out
34	19	Daniel Hemric (P)	52	Out
35	74	Caleb Costner	43	Out
36	9	Grant Enfinger (P)	3	Out

(P) indicates Playoff driver
(S1) indicates Stage 1 winner
(S2) indicates Stage 2 winner
(X) indicates Xfinity Fastest Lap
# indicates Rookie of the Year contender
(i) indicates a driver ineligible to score points

NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series Playoff Grid (1 race remaining in Round of 8):

1. Corey Heim (locked in)
2. Rajah Caruth, +14 points
3. Tyler Ankrum, +8
4. Kaden Honeycutt, +5
CUTLINE
5. Ty Majeski, -5
6. Layne Riggs, -6
7. Daniel Hemric, -32
8. Grant Enfinger, -40

Next up for the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series is the Slim Jim 200 at Matinsville Speedway on Friday, October 24. That race will be televised by FS1 with coverage set to kick off at 6:00 PM ET. The NASCAR Radio Network and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio will provide the radio broadcast of that event.