‘Names are Made Here’ in the NASCAR XFINITY Series and young Ohio-native Matt Tifft will be doing just that in 2016 with a 13-race schedule behind the wheel of the Joe Gibbs Racing #18 Toyota Camry. The 19-year old driver has 16-career starts in NASCAR’s top-three racing series over the last two seasons, while running a limited schedule in both the XFINITY Series and in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series. In these early stages of his career Tifft has successfully earned six top-10 finishes in the Camping World Tuck Series and a top-10 result from 2015 in the XFINITY Series. Additionally Tifft has raced competitively in NASCAR’s K&N; Pro West, K&N; Pro East and ARCA Series, as well as the X-1R Pro Cup Series. In 2015 Tifft made his first career XFNITY Series start and first entry with Joe Gibbs Racing at Kentucky Speedway in September. In what he described as a big learning experience, Tifft started from a 16th-place qualifying effort and made steady gains through the race, to bring home his first series finish in 10th place. Tifft’s 2016 XFINITY Series schedule will kick off at Richmond (Va.) International Raceway on April 23 and continues for a total of 13 scheduled races including: Dover International Speedway (May 14), Iowa Speedway (June 19), Daytona International Speedway (July 1), New Hampshire International Speedway (July 16), Iowa Speedway (July 30), Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course (August 13), Bristol Motor Speedway (August 19), Road America (August 27), Kentucky Speedway (September 24), Charlotte Motor Speedway (October 7), Texas Motor Speedway (November 5) and Homestead-Miami Speedway (November 19). Primary sponsorship across the 13 designated races with Tifft in the #18 continue to be developed and will be announced at a later date.(Joe Gibbs Racing)
