13th Place Finish Earns Raybestos Rookie Featherlite Most Improved Driver of the Race Award

With the U.S. Army on the hood to march him back home to Indiana, Raybestos Rookie Kraig Kinser in turn marched his No. 46 Morgan-Dollar Motorsports Silverado through the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series field to score his career-best finish at O'Reilly Raceway Park. For his 13th place finish, the Bloomington, IN native earned the Featherlite Most Improved Driver of the Race award given to the driver who improves their finishing position the most from their starting position.

Kinser, in his first season of NASCAR competition, started in the 28th spot for the 200-lap race. With new crew chief Eric Phillips calling from a top the pit box, Kinser was cautious through the first few laps of the race to let the 36-truck field settle in to do battle on the .686-mile track. Once the rhythm of the race was established, Kinser began to pick off his competition one truck at a time.

By the halfway point of the race, Kinser was solidly in the top-20. After a great final pit stop by his over-the-wall crew and despite a couple of brushes with the outside wall, Kinser made a charge the last 30 laps of the race to score his first top-15 NCTS finish.

"It was a pretty good race for us," said Kinser. "We were just fighting track position from where we started. We had a good truck. I made a couple rookie mistakes and hit the wall a couple of times but it was a good night. The guys gave me a really good U.S. Army Silverado and we were racing hard, the whole team was working hard. It was a good night for all of us. I am just really happy for Eric (Phillips) and everyone on the whole team. I just tried to turn left all night and go as quick as I could."

In his first full-time season of pavement racing, Kinser's U.S. Army sponsored Silverado is a joint effort between MDM and MB2 Motorsports. Kinser joined the MB2 driver development program last season.