Corey Heim heads to Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course Saturday for his first road course start in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series this season. Heim, who turned 20 on Tuesday, will be looking to bring home a little birthday week bonus at the 2.258-mile road course with it being the final race of the Triple Truck Challenge. The Georgia native cashed in on an extra $50,000 with his win at World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway for the first leg of the Triple Truck Challenge. If he is able to get to victory lane on Saturday and win two of the three events, his bonus would increase to $150,000.
Saturday’s event will mark the first time that the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series has raced at the 2.258-mile, 13-turn road course, but will be Heim’s third trip to the track. The Toyota Racing Development driver captured the pole and went on to finish seventh in last year’s ARCA Menards Series event at Mid-Ohio. To get more track time before Saturday’s Truck Series race, Heim raced in the Trans Am Series TA2 division at Mid-Ohio on June 26. He started 16th and finished eighth in the 38-lap event. He has one road course start in Truck Series action, an 18th-place finish at Watkins Glen (N.Y.) International last year.
Across seven Truck Series starts this season, Heim has produced two wins, 61 laps led, two top-five and three top-10 finishes resulting in an average finish of 18.6. The Georgia native picked up his first career Truck Series victory in just his fifth start earlier this season at Atlanta (Ga.) Motor Speedway and was also victorious at Gateway. He has led at least one lap in four of his seven starts this season and qualified inside the top five for each of his last five starts.
With two victories across his first 10 Truck Series starts, the 19-year-old driver is one of just 12 drivers in series history to net multiple victories in their first 10 starts. Kasey Kahne and Mike Skinner each produced five victories, Mark Martin collected four wins, Ron Hornaday Jr., Ted Musgrave and William Byron brought home three checkered flags and Heim, Kyle Busch, Erik Jones, Rich Bickle, Clint Bowyer and Tony Stewart all delivered two wins.
Heim is competing for the 2022 Truck Series Sunoco Rookie of the Year award. Despite only having competed in seven of the 14 events so far this season, he sits second in the standings, eight points behind Lawless Alan. Heim will look to join three other KBM drivers that have won the award, reigning winner Chandler Smith, William Byron (2016) and Erik Jones (2015).
In addition to his part-time Truck Series schedule Heim is competing in a six-race schedule for Venturini Motorsports in the ARCA Menards Series. Heim led 74 of 90 laps en route to the victory at Daytona in February to pick up his eighth career ARCA Menards Series victory. Across 40 career ARCA Menards Series starts he has produced 659 laps led, 29 top-five and 38 top-10 finishes resulting in an average finish of 4.4. Heim finished second to Ty Gibbs in the 2021 ARCA Menards Series championship standings.
Mardy Lindley returned to KBM for his second season atop the pit box of the No. 51 team. Lindley has led his team to six wins since coming to KBM at the start of the 2021 season, including two with Heim and one with Kyle Busch this year. In 2021, his drivers produced three victories, two with Busch and one with Martin Truex Jr. Before arriving at KBM, Lindley guided his drivers to 32 wins and four ARCA Menards Series East championships since 2013, including back-to-back titles with Sam Mayer the last two seasons. Additionally, he earned the ARCA Menards Series Sioux Chief Showdown championship with Mayer in 2020. Lindley has called the shots for five races on road courses in Truck Series action recording one win, two top-five and two top-10 finishes. Kyle Busch collected the victory last month at Sonoma Raceway.
JBL, the authority in engineering superior sound, returns to KBM for an eighth season and will be the primary sponsor on Heim’s Toyota for 11 races this season including Saturday’s race at Mid-Ohio.
Corey Heim, Driver Q&A:
What are your expectations heading into your first road course start of the season?
“I feel like our expectations are really high for this weekend. I’ve really made it a point to improve with these style of races – made a couple TA2 starts in the past year, including recently at Mid-Ohio. I’ve been there in a TA2 car and an ARCA car just getting laps and it’s the same course, so I’m hoping it’ll translate well. Really looking forward to it.”
You had a pole and a top-10 finish at Mid-Ohio in the ARCA Menards Series last year. Do you feel that the trucks will drive similar?
“I think it will be pretty similar based on all the sim work I’ve done in the last couple of months with my KBM team. Our JBL Tundra TRD Pro has been really good in sim and I feel like that has been a point of emphasis this year, as far as when we are really good in sim and I feel good about it, it translates very well to the real world as well. So, if it all translates well again, I think we’ll be really good.”
The 51 team had a near-win at COTA and a win with Kyle at Sonoma. Does that give you confidence heading into this weekend?
“For sure, Kyle (Busch) should’ve won COTA and did win Sonoma and think he led the most laps in both those races and had a lot of success. It’s definitely a privilege to be able to race a road course race with these guys with how fast they’ve been this year and hopefully that translates over for me as well.”
Corey Heim Career Highlights:
Picked up first career NASCAR Camping World Truck Series victory at Atlanta Motor Speedway March 19, 2022 in just his fifth start. Across 10 career starts has two wins, 63 laps led, two top-five and three top-10 finishes resulting in an average finish of 18.2.
Made three Truck Series starts in 2021 with a best result of 11th coming at Martinsville Speedway in October.
Finished runner-up in the ARCA Menards Series championship standings in 2021 after collecting six wins, three poles, 406 laps led, 16 top-five and 20 top-10 finishes resulting in an average finish of 3.1 across 20 starts.
Across 40 career ARCA Menards Series starts has eight wins, 659 laps led, 29 top-five and 38 top-10 finishes resulting in an average finish of 4.4. Picked up his first career ARCA Menards Series victory at Kansas Speedway Oct. 16, 2020.
Corey Heim’s No. 51 JBL Tundra TRD Pro:
KBM-71: The No. 51 JBL team will unload KBM-71 for Saturday’s race at Mid-Ohio. This is the same Tundra TRD Pro that KBM owner-driver Kyle Busch led 45 of 75 laps with en route to victory at Sonoma (Calif.) Raceway last month. Busch also led a race-high 31 laps with it earlier this year at Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Tex., but was relegated to a third-place finish after getting run over the course on the first lap of the second NASCAR overtime. John Hunter Nemechek finished second with KBM-71 in its maiden start last year at Watkins Glen (N.Y.) International.
Across 38 starts on road courses, KBM drivers have earned two wins, 15 top-five and 18 top-10 finishes, with an average starting position of 9.3 and an average finish of 11.7.
Owner-driver Kyle Busch earned his organization’s most recent road course win in June at Sonoma (Calif.) Raceway. Erik Jones picked up KBM’s first road course victory in 2015 at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park in Bowmanville, Ont.
KBM holds the Camping World Truck Series records for most career wins (95) and most wins in a single season (14 in 2014). With his victory at Atlanta Motor Speedway Heim became the 18th different driver to win a Truck Series event for KBM. In addition to collecting a series-record seven Owner’s Championships, the organization has produced two championship-winning drivers: Erik Jones (2015) and Christopher Bell (2017).
With 40 victories, the No. 51 is the winningest number in KBM’s Truck Series fleet
