{"id":23041,"date":"2018-11-16T22:50:24","date_gmt":"2018-11-17T04:50:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/?p=23041"},"modified":"2018-11-19T14:27:35","modified_gmt":"2018-11-19T20:27:35","slug":"hattori-racing-exceeds-all-expectations-in-2018","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/2018\/11\/16\/hattori-racing-exceeds-all-expectations-in-2018\/","title":{"rendered":"Hattori Racing exceeds all expectations in 2018"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Holly Cain, NASCAR Wire Service<\/em><\/p>\n

HOMESTEAD, Fla. \u2013 Brett Moffitt<\/strong> turned an unlikely NASCAR Camping World Truck Series<\/a> championship bid into a Cinderella championship hoist Friday night at Homestead-Miami Speedway \u2013 earning his Hattori Racing Enterprises<\/strong> team its first ever NASCAR title with a resounding victory at the track.<\/p>\n

\"\"

Brett Moffitt, driver of the #16 AISIN Group Toyota, celebrates in victory lane with the trophy after winning the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series Ford EcoBoost 200 and the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series Championship at Homestead-Miami Speedway on November 16, 2018 in Homestead, Florida. (Photo by Chris Graythen\/Getty Images)<\/p><\/div>\n

It\u2019s the same track where team owner Shigeaki Hattori won as a driver 20 years ago competing in an Indy Lights Series race. The NASCAR title is the first ever for the popular Japanese owner, Hattori and stands as a huge achievement for a team that has only 10 fulltime employees, led by veteran crew chief Scott Zipadelli.<\/p>\n

The Moffitt-Zipadelli combination scored the first six wins in team history this season but none was more important than Friday night\u2019s at Homestead \u2013 Moffitt\u2019s first time competing in a truck race at the 1.5-mile track.<\/p>\n

\u201cThose were longest 12 laps of my life,” Moffitt said of the final laps of the race – grinning widely in his Movember mustache.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is the first race we\u2019ve been up front for most of it.\u201d<\/p>\n

That\u2019s certainly true. Of his six victories, Moffitt won one race leading the final two laps (Atlanta). Twice (at Michigan and Chicago) he led only the final lap en route to victory. And it only made his effort and the team\u2019s determination more inspiring. At one point \u2013 even with the Playoff-qualifying early season victory \u2013 the team nearly had to park the truck, needing sponsorship to carry on.<\/p>\n

FR8Auctions.com came on board to literally sustain the Hattori effort this summer \u2013 appearing on Moffitt\u2019s Chicago-winning No. 16 Toyota – and the team was able to continue its championship quest. Only 2016 champ Johnny Sauter \u2013 also a championship finalist Friday \u2013 won as many races as Moffitt this season.<\/p>\n

In the last four races of the 2018 championship Playoffs, Moffitt \u2013 a member of NASCAR\u2019s inaugural \u201cNASCAR NEXT\u201d class in 2011 –  finished runner-up (Martinsville Va.), third place (at Texas) and won back-to-back at Phoenix\u2019s ISM Raceway and then Homestead-Miami.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think everyone understands, we have nine or 10 employees working seven days a week working till midnight more times than not,” Moffitt said of the team\u2019s effort. \u201cIt\u2019s a testament to them. I\u2019m fortunate to drive the truck but it\u2019s an honor to drive for them.”<\/p>\n

Zipadelli agreed.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s kind of amazing really and it feels good,” he said. \u201cGoing into this race, everyone asks \u201cAre you nervous?\u201d Nope. We\u2019re not even supposed to be here . We exceeded all the expectations of our peers and competitors.<\/p>\n

\u201cSaying that, we had all the confidence we could do it. And we did it with people not \u2018stuff\u2019 and big budgets. We did it with people and heart. I\u2019ve had to kick em\u2019 out of the shop at 1 in the morning. They\u2019d be there at 5:30 in the morning and they\u2019d leave at midnight.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been an amazing journey and taught us a lot about ourselves and what you can do it if you focus on the right things. Brett did an amazing job all season driving the truck and working for Shigeaki is a pleasure.\u201d<\/p>\n

In all, Moffitt led 59 of the 134 laps in the No. 16 AISIN Group Toyota Tundra including the final 28 laps. He beat Grant Enfinger to the checkered flag by 2.0-seconds. Kyle Busch Motorsports driver Noah Gragson finished third \u2013 next highest for a championship contender. Other championship eligible drivers, GMS teammates Justin Haley and Sauter finished eighth and 12th, respectively.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re a small team but everybody did a great job,” Shigeaki said. \u201cI\u2019m so happy.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Holly Cain, NASCAR Wire Service HOMESTEAD, Fla. \u2013 Brett Moffitt turned an unlikely NASCAR Camping World Truck Series championship bid into a Cinderella championship hoist Friday night at Homestead-Miami Speedway \u2013 earning his Hattori Racing Enterprises team its first ever NASCAR title with a resounding victory at the track. It\u2019s the same track where team […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":676,"featured_media":23042,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[11],"tags":[16,160,268],"class_list":["post-23041","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nascar","tag-nascar","tag-nascar-camping-world-truck-series","tag-ncwts"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/racedaysa.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/11\/358627-1.jpg?fit=5126%2C3417","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7hzTZ-5ZD","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23041","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/676"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23041"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23041\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23043,"href":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23041\/revisions\/23043"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23042"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23041"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23041"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23041"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}