Corey Day stepped into the No. 7 Spire Motorsports truck following Kyle Busch’s sudden passing, carrying both opportunity and emotional weight into the Charlotte weekend. But his run ended early after a violent crash on Lap 47 of a rain-delayed NASCAR Truck Series race at Charlotte Motor Speedway.
The weekend itself had already been disrupted. Originally scheduled for Friday night, the Truck race was pushed multiple times due to weather – first to Saturday morning, then Saturday night, and finally to Sunday at 10 a.m. ET. By the time the green flag dropped, teams had limited track time, and drivers were still adapting.
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For Day, that meant learning on the fly in a truck he had not originally prepared to race. His race came to an abrupt halt midway through Stage 2. Running in the pack, Day was turned after contact from Gio Ruggiero on the backstretch.
The No. 7 truck snapped toward the infield, lifted off the ground with all four tires briefly airborne, and then slammed hard into the inside SAFER barrier on the driver’s side. The impact sent him back up the track, where he was hit again by Mini Tyrell.
After being evaluated and released from the infield care center, Day did not hide his frustration.
“Yeah, crazy weekend for sure, just with weather delays and obviously the situation this week with Kyle (Busch) is just terrible. So I just personally just very upset at myself for the decision there on the track. All I wanted to do today was have a good run for these guys, and I ended it in a terrible way.”
Corey Day also pointed to the lack of track time as a factor in how the race unfolded for him.
“I think track time was big last night for sure. Those were my first competitive laps here. So, they were helpful for sure. Obviously, a truck races very differently around here than an O’Reilly car, though.”
Corey Day had started from the pole after qualifying was washed out earlier in the weekend, but the race quickly turned into a survival contest with constant cautions and shifting track conditions. His crash removed him from contention before the race reached its closing stretch, where Layne Riggs clinched the win.
Corey Day opens up on airborne moment during Charlotte crash
Corey Day’s Truck race had started with promise. He led the field to green from the pole and held track position early before the first caution shuffled the order. As the race progressed into Stage 2, the field tightened, and aggressive racing through traffic increased the risk of contact.
The decisive moment came on Lap 47. As cars ran tightly packed on the backstretch, contact from Ruggiero turned Day’s truck sideways and ended it with a DNF. When asked what goes through a driver’s mind in that moment, Day said:
“Yeah, it was scary obviously because it’s going towards the inside wall… I’ve been in the air at the sprint car before, but not in a NASCAR, so just glad it stayed on all fours.”
Despite the result, Corey Day’s overall weekend still showed flashes of pace. A day earlier, he had finished fifth in the O’Reilly Auto Parts Series race, continuing a strong run in his full-time effort in the HendrickCars.com No. 17 entry.
Edited by Anurup Chakraborty