Hayley Aspires for K&N East Breakthrough, Truck Ride
Cameron Hayley of Calgary finished eleventh in his NASCAR Camping World Truck Series debut at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park in Bowmanville, ONT on Sunday. He qualified tenth in the No. 32 Cabinets by Hayley Chevrolet for Turner Scott Motorsports, and ran solid throughout the day.
“I knew it was going to be tough coming in, and I think we did well,” Hayley said. “I qualified in the top 10, which was our goal, and felt that I could do a little bit better in the race. But we were up to seventh at one point I believe and just kept rallying back and the cautions never really worked out in our favor, but we were really happy with the day and just learned a ton.”
“It was crazy how fast the track was and there really was no slow section,” Hayley said of the 2.46 mile track. “Most of the time on a road course, you use all four gears and spend most of your time in second around these tighter road courses and this track you spent most of your time in third and fourth, which shows how quick the track was and it was definitely the fastest one I’ve ever been on.”
Hayley prepared with two road course tests and the two most recent K&N Pro Series East races at Watkins Glen International and Virginia International Raceway. He finished eighth at Watkins Glen and second at VIR, matching his career best series finish.
“It definitely helped me get into the rhythm that you talked about of road course racing,” Hayley said. “It was tough though. It was my first time in a truck. I had to get used to the power. I had to get used to the way the truck handled and it made it difficult to get that rhythm down, but the two road course races prior to that definitely helped this weekend.”
He will enter upcoming races at New Hampshire in September and Texas in October. Hayley’s goal for Loudon is a top 10 finish. Hayley finished fifteenth in his first New Hampshire race in July.
“It’s definitely, definitely going to be another learning experience for me,” Hayley said. “… I know the truck has a lot different aero package on it and it’s just going to feel different to drive. … You’re going to have those live pit stops again which I did pretty well on the road course, but an oval is a whole another monster.”
Hayley said that his first race on a 1.5 mile oval will be a “huge learning curve.” Texas will “be the biggest challenge out of all three of them.” … but I know Turner Scott has a great program in terms of the truck series and I think I’m going to have the best shot that I can get in their equipment and I’m just going to do what I can in Texas.”
Hayley graduated high school and won the Summer Showdown at Evergreen Speedway in Washington in June. Hayley led all 200 circuits to claim the $21,000 prize.
“It’s been amazing with the opportunities I’ve been given, the accomplishments I’ve had this year, but I look at it as all learning stuff,” Hayley said. “I learned a lot, whether it was good races, whether it was bad races and it’s all about moving forward. And next year I’m looking for some funding to do a fulltime truck program, so hopefully somebody will be pleased with me enough to help me out with that.”
Hayley called it “a huge priority of mine” to obtain funding for a ride next season.
“I’ve had a great few years and I’m just blessed to be able to get an opportunity. …a lot of teenagers in the world would die to be where I am and I’m just blessed to be where I am today.”
Hayley drove for Bill McAnally and Gene Price in the NASCAR K&N Series West. He finished second in points and won at All American Speedway in Roseville, CA last season. He has 19 top fives, 26 top 10s and six poles.
Hayley said that “It’s helped me a ton.” He called the teams he has driven for “amazing teams. They’ve all helped me in their own different ways and they’ve really gotten me to the point that I’m at today, and you talked about racing being a huge team sport and it is a huge team.
“…I’m the part of the puzzle that gets all the press and PR, but there’s so many other people behind the scenes that a lot of people don’t realize put in so much time and effort into allowing me to go fast. And all those teams have done an amazing job with me and I’m sure the teams that come here in the future will be just the same way.”
Hayley joined a five car team in Turner Scott Motorsports this season with Kaz Grala, Scott Heckert, Brandon Jones, and Ben Rhodes. Hayley is driving for the No. 98 team that Dylan Kwasniewski won six races and the championship in 2013.
“Coming into the East Series blatantly I was expecting a championship and I knew we had the team to run for a championship,” Hayley said. “And as the season got started we had a good run at New Smyrna to start the year off. But since then we really haven’t had a lot of races to get acclimated in terms of me and my team.
“… I think I work well with my team. I don’t think I work amazing with my team like Dylan (Kwasniewski) and them did last year, but I mean that’s just something that just takes time and we haven’t hit it quite perfectly on the head yet. But hopefully in these next couple of races we’ll be better than we have been.”
Hayley has six top fives in 14 starts this season, but he also has six finishes outside the top 10.
“It’s been a huge roller coaster of a year and you always have those years,” Hayley said. “But I’m just glad it’s not a bad year. I definitely can’t say it’s been a bad year, but it hasn’t been a good year either.
Hayley is eager for a win before his season ends, but he wants to maintain his consistency with three top 10s in the last four races, including two second place runs.
“I definitely want to get a couple of solid finishes here first and foremost, but at the same time, I really want to go for that win,” Hayley said. “I think we’re at the point now where Ben’s too far ahead in the championship to actually win it, but that just gives us a little more pressure off our back and just allows us to maybe take a few more chances than he would and try and go get that win by the end of the year.”
The penultimate race of the NASCAR K&N Pro Series East season is Saturday night at Greenville Pickens Speedway in Easley, SC. The Greenville 140. Hayley qualified second and finished third to Rhodes in March. The half mile oval opened in 1946 and is known for its abrasive surface. The track hosted 29 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series races between 1951 and 1971.
“It’s a very flat track, it’s wore out, and it’s just a slow race,” Hayley said. “I mean wore out is really the keyword to describe Greenville. It’s really tough on tires and it’s just a race that you really can’t race the other cars. You have to race the track more than the other racecars and it’s all about saving your tires and having enough to be there at the end and hopefully that’s exactly what we’re going to do and win this race this weekend.”
Greenville may be Hayley’s best opportunity for a breakthrough win. Turner Scott Motorsports has won the last two races there with Dylan Kwasniewski and Ben Rhodes. In 12 previous series races, only Darrell Wallace, Jr. has recorded multiple victories. Six drivers won their first race at Greenville: Sean Caisse 2006, Joey Logano 2007, Austin Dillon 2008, Darrell Wallace, Jr. 2010, Brandon Gdovic 2013, Ben Rhodes 2014.
“This race is going to be a really good opportunity for me to get that win,” Hayley said. “I know all of my Turner Scott Motorsports teammates are going to be tough like they always are and you’re always going to have good cars out there. But I think we’ve got everything in a row that we need to have and it just comes down to that it’s up to me, it’s up to my crew chief and I think that we can get it done this weekend.”
Mardy Lindley is Hayley’s crew chief. Mardy Lindley won the 1995 Greenville track championship before moving to the X-1R Pro Cup Series. He won 11 races between 2000 and 2006.
His father Butch Lindley won an estimated 550 races. The Greenville, SC driver was the 1972 track champion at Greenville before becoming a standout in NASCAR Late Model Sportsman cars, winning the national championship in 1977-78. He won high profile races like the All American 400, Oxford 250, Snowball Derby and Vermont Milk Bowl.
During his limited stint in NASCAR Sprint Cup, he finished second to Harry Gant at Martinsville in 1982. Lindley won four races in the inaugural NASCAR Nationwide Series season: Richmond (2), South Boston (2), Richmond (3) and Martinsville (3). Sam Ard matched Lindley’s mark, but only eventual champion Jack Ingram had more wins (six). He won twice in 1983 at Caraway and Greenville. He also excelled in the All Pro Super Series, becoming the series win leader in the mid1980s. He suffered fatal injuries in a 1985 racing accident at DeSoto Speedway.
“It’s definitely a huge, huge thing for me to have that knowledge as a past champion there,” Hayley said. “I know Mardy has a ton of knowledge himself and it’s going to come down to track conditions. Obviously the tracks change over the years and change from last year, so you’ve always got to change things a little bit here and there. And hopefully like I said, we have everything in a row. We just need to execute the race perfectly, have a little luck on our side and I think you’ll see us in victory lane.”
Lindley has worked with Ricky Stenhouse, Jr., Greg Biffle at Roush Fenway Racing. In the NASCAR K&N Pro Series East, he has been crew chief for Bryan Ortiz at Rev Racing before joining Turner Scott Motorsports for 2013. Paired with Dylan Kwasniewski, the team won six races and the championship last season.
“He’s been a great crew chief and he’s taught me a lot about myself, about the racecar, about everything,” Hayley said. “And like we said earlier, I don’t think we’ve been a standout combination. I don’t think we’ve been a perfect combination, but we have done some good things together. We’ve had some good races and we’ve just been working all year. It’s always tough to come to a brand new team, a brand new crew, brand new crew chief and we’re working on it and hopefully these last two races we’ll be really good.”
Hayley is looking at entering major Late Model races later this season, including the Snowball Derby at Five Flags Speedway in Pensacola, FL December 3-7.
The NASCAR K&N Pro Series East finale is the Drive Sober 150 at Dover International Speedway on September 26.
Sources: Nicholas Teto, YankeeRacer.com
Greenville 140 Notes
Since 2001, the points leader entering the final two races won the championship. Ben Rhodes holds a 65 point lead over Cameron Hayley. The Louisville, KY driver needs to finish better than Hayley or thirteenth or better to clinch.
Turner Scott Motorsports is looking for its second consecutive championship. The Mooresville, NC operation has the top three drivers in points: Rhodes, Hayley and Brandon Jones. The No. 41 Alpha Energy Solutions team is led by former NASCAR Whelen All-American Series national champion Mark McFarland.
Rhodes looks to join Joey Logano (2007) and Dylan Kwasniewski (2013) as Greenville winners who claimed the NASCAR K&N Pro Series East championship in the same season.