TRUCKS: Brutal tight condition causes Clayton Green to be black flagged for failing to meet minimum speed at Bristol
by Brock Beard / LASTCAR.info Editor-in-Chief
IMAGE: Team Reaume, @TeamReaume
Clayton Green picked up the 5th last-place finish of his NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series career in Friday’s Tennessee Army National Guard 250 at the Bristol Motor Speedway when his #22 Badass Workbench Ford was flagged off the track for running too slow after he completed 103 of 250 laps.
The finish, which came in Green’s 13th series start, was his first of the season and first in a Truck Series race since October 24, 2025 at Martinsville, seven races ago. In the Truck Series’ last-place rankings, it was the 8th for running too slow, the 10th for the #22, and the 143rd for Ford. Across NASCAR’s top three series, it was the 12th for running too slow, the 49th for the #22, and the 1,090th for Ford.
When Green was last featured on this website, he’d finally landed an opportunity to run a full race as his family’s business, Royal Vista, Inc., would sponsor Team Reaume’s #2 Ford for the championship race at Phoenix. Prior to that, Green had been one of the team’s “start-and-park” drivers, yielding three consecutive last-place finishes that summer. Looking to maximize the effort, a deal was worked out for Green to run his Phoenix truck a week early at Martinsville. But a crash in practice destroyed the rear clip, forcing Green to park his damaged truck before the field had even left pit road. Driving a backup truck in Phoenix, he recovered nicely, taking a career-best 20th. He’s since run another three full-race efforts in 2026, taking 23rd in Atlanta, then 29th both at Darlington and just last Friday in Rockingham, where Royal Vista was again his sponsor.
For Bristol, Green would run Team Reaume’s #22 entry with sponsorship from Badass Industries, which promoted their line of rugged workbenches and other tables designed for industrial use. His was among the 36 trucks entered for as many starting spots, meaning all would qualify for Friday’s race. In opening practice, he ranked slowest overall. His best lap came near the end of his 49-lap run, clocking in at 16.372 seconds (117.200mph). His was the fourth truck to take time in qualifying, where he secured the 32nd starting spot – the first among those relying on Owner Points – with a best lap of 15.862 seconds (120.986mph), an improvement of a half-second from practice.
Securing the 36th and final starting spot was the #71 Freeway Insurance Chevrolet of Daniel Suarez, who was one of seven Cup Series drivers competing in the race. Suarez didn’t take a timed lap as he’d incurred an unapproved adjustments penalty to replace his steering box, which failed five laps into practice. Also not taking time for similar reasons were both 35th-place Timmy Hill in the #56 UNITS Toyota and 34th-place Dawson Sutton in the #26 Tennessee VOLS Chevrolet. With all three incurring the same penalties, the field addressed the starter’s stand with Suarez still in last place, trailing he outside line, and Hill trailing the inside line.
When the green flag dropped, Suarez remained in the last spot, and was about one truck length of open space behind the now 35th-place Sutton off Turn 2, and was 6.031 seconds back of the lead to start Lap 2. By Lap 5, Suarez climbed past Sutton, who was now 7.371 seconds back of the lead with Suarez alongside at the stripe at a 7.366. Sutton then jumped to 34th on Lap 7, dropping Green to 35th with Suarez again in last place, 9.237 seconds back of the lead. Suarez quickly got past Green, who was now 10.238 seconds back of the leader on Lap 8. That time by, Green’s crew was reminding him to breathe and to not overuse his brakes.
By Lap 13, Green was 13.028 seconds back of the lead and a half-second behind the still 35th-place Suarez. He was still holding the spot on Lap 17, where a battle around the 27th spot saw Andres Perez de Lara spin his #44 Telcel Chevrolet while running to the inside of Kris Wright, who forced down Perez de Lara with his #81 F.N.B. Corporation / iHeart Radio Chevrolet. Someone on Perez de Lara’s team expressed his frustration with Wright, saying he “doesn’t know how to race,” and telling their driver, “next time you get hit just fuckin’ ship him.”
Perez de Lara’s crew further thought their driver wasn’t lapped until after the caution came out, but NASCAR directed him to line up behind 6th-place lead-lap driver Chase Briscoe in the #5 Hasty Bake / Mobil 1 Toyota. Incidentally, Briscoe was nearly sent to a backup truck after his truck caught fire in the inspection line. Now the lone driver off the lead lap, Perez de Lara remained in the 36th spot. His crew suggested he restart in the high lane, but the message came so late that he couldn’t make the move without running over the commitment cone, leaving him in the low lane. By then, the 35th spot belonged to Carson Ferguson, the dirt late model star who was making his series debut in the #25 Ram Trucks RAM.
On the restart, Kris Wright jumped to the low lane to force a three-wide pass at the stripe below Tanner Gray’s #15 Place of Hope Toyota and Luke Baldwin’s #2 Ford Racing Ford. This handed Wright a penalty for changing lanes, forcing him to pit road for a pass-through. This dropped Wright off the lead lap and into last place on Lap 29, at which point he was already in danger of losing a second lap. When he did lose that second lap to then-leader Christian Eckes around Lap 39, Wright’s spotter advised his driver to do a better job staying out of the way of the leader, saying “that wasn’t good.”
By Lap 48, Perez de Lara had climbed to 34th, passing Green who was again in the 35th spot. On Lap 54, Green lost a second lap to the leaders when he ran the high lane through Turns 3 and 4. With only a few laps until the end of Stage 1, Green was black flagged for not maintaining minimum speed, and he came down pit road. Green complained his truck was so tight in the middle of the corner that he couldn’t keep it on the low lane. He returned to the track as the new last-place runner, now six laps down, only to incur an additional pit penalty. Instead of rolling the penalty into the Stage 1 caution, Green was forced to come in a second time, dropping him between seven and eight laps down by the time Stage 1 ended.
During the Stage 1 caution, Green’s crew discussed a similar issue the team had in practice, that the air pressure in the right-front tire built up so much that the truck became difficult to turn. The team further said that Green may have been overdriving the truck, causing the pressure to build up more. He restarted Stage 2 in last place, but ultimately pulled behind the wall around Lap 110, listed out by reason of running too slow. For some reason, FS1’s leaderboard instead showed Green in 34th with teammate Luke Baldwin’s #2 in last place. Baldwin instead took 32nd, collected in a dramatic pileup on Lap 180 that also eliminated both race leader Corey Heim in the #1 Celsius Toyota and teammate Kaden Honeycutt, the polesitter, in the #11 Safelite Toyota.
The rest of the Bottom Five was completed by a separate accident on Lap 118 where Frankie Muniz’ #33 Ford, sponsored by his rebooted FOX sitcom, “Malcolm in the Middle: Life’s Still Unfair,” tangled with Tyler Reif’s #42 Precision Vehicle Logistics Chevrolet and collected Timmy Hill’s #56. Muniz took 35th with Reif 34th and Hill in 33rd.
Sutton and Queen earn top-ten finishes
Running a bright orange and camo scheme for the Tennessee Vols, Dawson Sutton earned just the fourth top-ten finish of his career and first of the season, his best run since a career-best 4th at Talladega last fall. Sutton rallied from 34th on the grid and briefly ran in last place during the opening stages.
Also earning his fourth top-ten finish on Friday was Brenden “Butterbean” Queen, whose #12 Cummins RAM finished in the 10th spot. This marked his second top-ten run of the year, his first since a 7th in the season opener in Daytona. Queen’s own career best performance of 4th came at North Wilkesboro last year, whe he drove for TRICON Garage.
LASTCAR STATISTICS
*This marked the first last-place finish for the #22 in a Truck Series race at Bristol.
*The 103 laps completed by Green set a record for most laps run by a Truck Series last-place finisher classified out for running too slow. The previous mark of 72 laps as set by Norm Benning at Atlanta – still a longer distance than Green’s – on March 30, 2021.
THE BOTTOM FIVE
36) #22-Clayton Green / 103 laps / too slow
35) #33-Frankie Muniz / 115 laps / crash
34) #42-Tyler Reif / 117 laps / crash
33) #56-Timmy Hill / 120 laps / crash
32) #2-Luke Baldwin / 178 laps / crash
2026 LASTCAR TRUCK SERIES OWNER'S CHAMPIONSHIP
1st) Front Row Motorsports, Halmar Friesen Racing, McAnally-Hilgemann Racing, Niece Motorsports, Team Reaume, ThorSport Racing (1)
2026 LASTCAR TRUCK SERIES MANUFACTURER'S CHAMPIONSHIP
1st) Ford (3)
2nd) Chevrolet (2)
3rd) Toyota (1)
2026 LASTCAR TRUCK SERIES DRIVER'S CHAMPIONSHIP
