NASCAR Xfinity Series regular Joey Gase plans to contest his sixth Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series race of 2019 on Saturday night in the Coke Zero Sugar 400 at Daytona International Speedway. But instead of driving an MBM Motorsports entry, he'll be behind the wheel of the #53 Rick Ware Racing car.
“Joey Gase is a fine driver and always does great at the superspeedways, and I am expecting the same out of Joey this weekend,” RWR owner Rick Ware said. “We are also excited to have Connected Claim Services, EFX Corp, Action Restoration and TrackDown joining us this weekend, which plans to be a very fun and exciting weekend at Daytona. It speaks volumes about our team to have such quality companies represented on our cars. Our teams have experienced some of our best finishes at Daytona, and we are all looking to build on that this weekend.”
Gase's #53 will be one of three cars at least partially racing under the Rick Ware Racing battle, joining the #52 of J.J. Yeley and the #51 driven by B.J. McLeod as a joint effort between RWR and Richard Petty Motorsports.
“I’m very excited and thankful to be racing under the lights the Fourth of July weekend at Daytona International Raceway in the Cup Series,” Gase said. “This is by far one of my favorite race weekends and the superspeedways are tracks I love racing at, because no matter if you are on a power house team or a small underfunded team everyone has a chance to win. I also really have to thank Rick for this opportunity and all of our partners for making this happen. If it wasn’t for each and every one of them we would not be able to race this weekend.”
Gase attempted to qualify an MBM car for the season-opening Daytona 500 at DIS in February but failed to do so. Only 40 cars are on the preliminary entry list for the Coke Zero Sugar 400, so qualifying for the race won't be an issue. In his five Cup Series races, so far, with MBM Motorsports this season, Gase has a best finish of 32nd in the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway in May, his most recent Cup Series race.
Gase has raced part-time in the Cup Series in 2014, the same race season in which he went full-time in the Xfinity Series, and has made 35-career Cup Series starts. His lone top-five finish in the Xfinity Series came in 2015 at Talladega Superspeedway, a superspeedway like Daytona.
