Eckes Running on NY Home Road for Road Course Breakthrough
Venue: Watkins Glen International
Events: Bully Hill Vineyards 176
Date: Friday, May 8th
Location: Watkins Glen, NY
Track Description: 2.54-mile road course
Distance: 72 laps / 176.4 miles (4:30 p.m. ET – FOX Sports 1, Motor Racing Network, SiriusXM)
Home Roads … Christian Eckes is back in his home state of New York to pursue his first-career road course triumph. The driver of the No. 91 NAPA Auto Care Chevrolet Silverado RST returns to the Empire State on the strength of consecutive top-10 results for the first time this season. Eckes most recently fought back from multiple battery changes to finish eighth at Texas Motor Speedway last Friday night. Two stage wins in the last four races have put him at the front of the field in his return to NASCAR CRAFTSMAN Trucks Series (NCTS) competition this season, in addition to leading 140 laps through seven races, the second-most among series regulars. Eckes hopes to parlay that pedigree with previous road course experience to fuel a run towards the checkers in his home state.
Making the Right Turns … While road course ringers might make pre-race headlines, Eckes has been a sneaky solid road course performer over his career across multiple series. In his previous two-year stint at MHR in 2023-2024, Eckes recorded his best NCTS road course finish of third at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course and led both starts at Circuit of the Americas (COTA) with MHR. He’s finished in the top-10 in 50% of his NCTS road course starts, including a pair of top-five’s at Mid-Ohio. He made all the right turns in his NASCAR Xfinity Series rookie season in 2025, collecting five top-10’s in seven road course races, including three top-five’s. He tallied a pair of fourth-place finishes at Portland International Raceway and south of the border in Mexico City. Additionally, Eckes finished second in Bill McAnally’s No. 19 NAPA entry in the ARCA Menards Series West event at Sonoma Raceway. He has two prior starts at “The Glen”, which includes an eighth-place finish in last year’s NXS event.
Season to Date … The “Revenge Tour” is picking up steam after recording his first set of back-to-back top-10 runs in 2026. Eckes sits sixth in the NCTS drivers’ point standings after seven of 18 regular season events with three top-five’s and four top-10 finishes. He’s searching for his first victory of the year, but has lowered his average finish to 11.9, fourth best among NCTS series regulars.
Tune In … Eckes hits the track Friday morning at 11:30 a.m. ET with practice and qualifying on FOX Sports 2. Race coverage switches to FOX Sports 1 for the green flag at 4:30 p.m. ET. Stay connected with the No. 91 NAPA Auto Care team by following @BMR_NASCAR on Twitter, @bmr_nascar on Instagram, and Bill McAnally Racing on Facebook.
Christian Eckes Quote:
On the first true road course of the season:
“It’s always nice to race near home and always enjoy Watkins Glen. Our NAPA Auto Care team has generated some momentum here in the last few weeks, so hopefully we can keep that going. I thought we had some good pace in our truck at St. Pete, even though The Glen is a lot different from the street course but still encouraging. It’ll be really fast paced this weekend with the cooler weather, and even at a road course track position is still really important, for sure. We always seemed to run pretty well on the road courses a couple of years ago and felt like we were usually a top-five truck. Never had outright dominant pace but we’re going to try and change that this week.”