Taylor Gray earned his first NASCAR O'Reilly Auto Parts Series victory of 2026 on Saturday at Kansas Speedway, holding off Sheldon Creed through a green-flag pit cycle and a tense final run to end a difficult start to his season in the best way possible.
The Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota driver credited a sharp call from the pit box for the breakthrough, naming crew chief Jason Ratcliffe as the architect of the win.
"First of all, thank you to everyone at Joe Gibbs Racing. How about (crew chief) Jason Ratcliffe? That pit call was awesome," Gray said in victory lane.
Gray had trailed Brandon Jones through much of the middle stages, but a timely adjustment and a quicker stop under green flipped the running order when the lead cycle completed.
"I knew we had a car capable of winning. I thought the No. 20 (Jones) was a little better than us before the green-flag cycle, but you just have to stay locked in. Jason made a really good adjustment on the car, a really good pit call, and got us the clean air."
The win was especially welcome for a driver who has brought speed but not results through the opening months of the season.
"It's been a long start to the year, man. Not that we're not bringing speed to the race track, but things just haven't gone our way. So it's nice to finally be able to close one out."
Behind Gray, Sheldon Creed recovered from a quiet afternoon to finish second in his Chevrolet, with Justin Allgaier completing the podium. Jesse Love took fourth ahead of fellow Toyota driver Brent Crews, Cup regular William Byron, Cole Custer, Brandon Jones, Sam Mayer and Ryan Sieg.
The race was defined — and nearly derailed — by a terrifying lap-three incident involving pole sitter Carson Kvapil. Running three-wide in the backstretch pack, the JR Motorsports driver was turned after contact with team-mate Byron and barrel-rolled multiple times down the frontstretch, drawing a 12-minute red flag for clean-up. Kvapil climbed out unhurt and was able to reflect with remarkable calm.
"Not too fun. I actually didn't think it was going to flip over like that, but once it started doing that, really didn't seem too bad," he said. "My biggest thing is that I just hate it for this whole Bass Pro Shop team. All-in-all, it was one heck of a ride. I was not ready for that, just hate it for all the guys."
The race restarted with a heavily depleted field at the front, setting up the strategic rumble that Ratcliffe ultimately won. Toyota's one-five finish — Gray in first, Crews in fifth — kept the manufacturer's impressive 2026 momentum rolling, and on a weekend where the Cup Series narrative was dominated by Reddick and Kansas overtime chaos, Gray grabbed back a sliver of the spotlight for the Xfinity ranks.
The series heads to Darlington next weekend, where a throwback round will test whether Gray's Kansas breakthrough is the turning point of his season or an outlier on a long road back to full-time contention.
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*Originally published on [Motorsports Global](https://motorsports.global/article/taylor-gray-conquers-kansas-chaos-with-first-xfinity-win-of-2026). Visit for full coverage.*