Heim Falls Short At The Rock After Late Stop For Fuel

Corey Heim (Jacob Seelman/Race Face Digital photo)

ROCKINGHAM, N.C. – For the third time this season in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series, Corey Heim stood on pit road after a race trying to put into words why it slipped away.

Though he already has two Truck Series wins in 2025 – at Daytona (Fla.) Int’l Speedway and Las Vegas (Nev.) Motor Speedway – the argument exists that Heim could have won five of the series’ seven races thus far.

A late electrical issue doomed him at Homestead-Miami (Fla.) Speedway and a spin while racing for the lead at Martinsville (Va.) Speedway took him out of contention there, but Friday’s Black’s Tire 200 at Rockingham Speedway was perhaps the most puzzling of Heim’s near-misses thus far.

After starting 15th, Heim steadily worked his way forward into contention during the final stage at ‘The Rock’, taking the lead on lap 119 after other frontrunners pitted for fuel and tires and proceeding to pace the field for a race-high 52 circuits.

However, because he last pitted during the second stage break just after lap 90, Heim didn’t have enough fuel to make the entire back half of the race without stopping again.

With no cautions in the final 77 laps, Heim was forced to stop for gas with 29 to go under green, dropping him off the lead lap and scuttling any chances of a late comeback.

Though he was able to improve back to eighth place at the finish – after multiple others ahead of him ran out of fuel in the final laps – it was the latest example of “another one that got away from us” for the 22-year-old from Marietta, Ga.

Heim circled a less-than-stellar qualifying lap as an early turning point in his day, forcing him to play catch-up on a .94-mile oval where the groove struggled to widen out throughout the race.

“I thought we were really good all day. I had a really good Tundra TRD Pro,” said Heim of his TRICON Garage-prepared, Safelite-sponsored No. 11. “I felt like if we had the track position we would have been in really good shape from the very start. Just didn’t have a good qualifying effort on my end. It was kind of an uphill battle from there all day.

“I didn’t exactly know what happened there the last 40 laps there, but we pitted, and it seems like some of the other guys didn’t run of fuel. Unfortunate to have that happen,” Heim added. “Just a weird deal in that last stage … but [I] have to be better on my part as far as qualifying better and having the track position from the beginning.

“We made our bed at the beginning of that last stage; we didn’t know if we were going to be battling the sunset and darkness or fuel [mileage]. But I thought we had the best truck.”

Corey Heim in action at Rockingham Speedway Friday evening. (Jacob Seelman/Race Face Digital photo)

When Heim was out front during the final stage, he opened up a lead of well over a second multiple times. But none of that mattered when his gas tank wasn’t in a position to cooperate on strategy.

“Honestly, once we got out front, it was clear sailing,” Heim noted. “Anytime I had 20 car lengths or so of clean air to the next guy, I could drive right up to him … but then I’d have the same issues as most others were where I’d just stall out [in the dirty air].

“I feel we were better than most, if not the best, but it just wasn’t our day today.”

Heim also tipped that he wasn’t thinking about cautions – or the lack thereof – in the closing laps because he and his team didn’t believe that anyone could feasibly stretch their fuel to the finish.

Yet race winner Tyler Ankrum did go 88 laps on a single tank, while Heim fell short of victory as a result.

“We’ll review this as a team and move forward, get better, but we thought we were on the right play,” Heim admitted. “As it turned out, we weren’t … but there’s nothing we could do about that.”

Friday was the first Truck Series race at Rockingham since 2013. The track was repaved in 2022, and though many drivers were complimentary of the racing product afterward, Heim wasn’t one of them.

“It was pretty bad,” Heim said. “It widened out for a little bit, but we’re just going too fast here and it’s too banked. We’re not off the gas much and there’s so much load and (on) throttle time that it makes it tough (to make passes).

“I could see this place really turning into something special with some age; I haven’t given up on it, by any means,” Heim clarified. “But certainly today, it was all track position. I felt like you probably could have stayed out on old tires, if you wanted to.

“If we give It five years, the racing might be really good here, but today wasn’t the best (showing).”

Heim heads into a Truck Series off week with a 22-point lead in the regular season standings over Chandler Smith. He’s led the points after each of the past four events.

The next race for the Truck Series is Friday night, May 2 at Texas Motor Speedway. Broadcast coverage of the SpeedyCash.com 250 is slated for 8 p.m. ET on FS1, the NASCAR Racing Network, and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, channel 90.