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Colin 3rd in Iowa and up to 6th in points
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NEWTON, Iowa – An unusually late start time for the inaugural Camping World Truck Series race at Iowa Speedway with the green flag not dropping until 9:02 CT didn’t seem to bother Colin Braun. The 20-year old battled inside the top 10 all night long, and with tremendous pit stops by his No. 6 Con-way Freight True LTL teammates, Braun was able to hold off point leader Ron Hornaday to wrap up his second consecutive third-place finish.

Braun qualified fourth early Saturday evening lining up beside the No. 88 of Matt Crafton to begin the Lucas Oil 200. After just one lap of racing the first caution of the evening came out and Braun had already dropped to seventh. The No. 6 continued to slip dropping to the 10th spot by lap 17 with Braun telling crew chief Mike Beam that his truck was tight in the center of the corners. Beam told his young driver just to keep it up out there and everything will come together. By lap 29 Braun was putting down lap times as fast as leader Mike Skinner.

Braun kept his momentum going chalking up the fastest times on the track by lap 43 and at the same time gaining on Hornaday for sixth-place. When the third caution came out on lap 57, it was time for the leaders to come to pit road for their first stops of the night. With Braun still battling a tight truck, Beam made the call to take fuel, four tires and a track bar adjustment. The outstanding work by the pit crew got Braun all the way up to the third position when racing resumed on lap 63.

The No. 6 Con-way Freight True LTL F-150 was now shown in the fourth position at the halfway point of the race with Braun now dealing with a loose-handling truck. A caution on lap 109 gave way to a final stop taking four tires, fuel and a wedge adjustment. Another quick stop by the No. 6 team allowed Braun to gain one spot on the restart with the No. 15 of Aric Almirola and Skinner holding down spots one and two respectively.

With just 34 laps to go of the 200-lap race, Braun held the fourth spot securely, but had his sights on Hornaday for third. As the laps ticked away Braun moved closer and closer to the back bumper of Hornaday. The two battled it out getting side-by-side with 11 laps to go and Braun eventually overtook him in turn two one lap later. Braun held off Hornaday in the closing laps following a restart to capture a third-place finish.
“I really got to give a lot of credit to Mike Beam and the crew. We were really bad yesterday during the full day of practice, but the guys worked their butts off and got it to where I could race up front all night. We were tight early, then the truck freed up later on in the race. I knew we had a good truck, but we had nothing for Skinner tonight. He was just that good. It was a lot of fun out there running hard with Ron [Hornaday]. We had a good points night and hopefully it will carry over to Gateway next week,” said Braun.
The No. 6 Con-way Freight True LTL team moved up one position to sixth in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series point standings, and is now only 14 points out of fifth place and 31 points out of fourth. The next race will be on Saturday, September 12 at Gateway International Raceway. It will be live on SPEED at 2:30 p.m. (ET).