Bret Holmes Leads Truck Underdogs Run to the Front at Daytona

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – Bret Holmes led just five laps as a NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series rookie.

At the start of his sophomore year, he led 12 in only one race, coming oh-so-close to leading the most important lap of all.

In the end, Holmes was fourth, recovering from a mid-race spin and surviving a last-lap wreck to deliver the second-best finish of his Truck career. It’s a huge boost for this small, independent team that gained full-season sponsorship from Precision Garage Doors in the offseason.

“It’s huge, man,” Holmes said of his run. “We got up front three times tonight, we had that strong of a truck… This is such an easy race to get in a hole, including Atlanta and Vegas, so having a top five here plus some stage points is huge.”

Holmes survived a series of issues, including a mid-race incident that collected Johnny Sauter and left the No. 45 Niece Motorsports truck out of the race. But what hurt Holmes the most was a penalty heading into overtime for hitting the imaginary choose cone on the racetrack. He chose neither the top or bottom lane, forcing NASCAR to send him to the rear on lap 98.

“I was screaming at myself,” Holmes said of that moment. “Just so mad at myself.”

But that wound up benefitting him in the long run. When a last-lap melee broke out on the backstretch, Holmes skated by with limited damage, nursing it to the finish line while most other lead-lap trucks weren’t so lucky.

He wasn’t the only one. Spencer Boyd, debuting with his Freedom Racing Enterprises team, wound up a strong fifth running former GMS Racing equipment. Boyd left Young’s Motorsports in the offseason, where he’d spent nearly his entire Truck career, and was rewarded with his first top-five finish since winning at Talladega Superspeedway back in 2019.

Sitting behind him in sixth was Stefan Parsons, posting his best-ever NASCAR Xfinity or Truck series finish in 77 career starts. Parsons, who’s been toiling in underfunded equipment, excelled in his debut running the underdog No. 75 Henderson Motorsports truck in place of Parker Kligerman.

Timmy Hill wound up eighth with his family-owned Hill Motorsports No. 56. But perhaps the best underdog story was the No. 28 of FDNY Racing, which typically runs just the Daytona season opener. It’s just the second-ever top-10 finish for the organization (ninth) with a team that highlights first responders and consists of a mostly volunteer crew.

Part-time…