Eckes to the #19 Chevrolet for McAnally in '23

Christian Eckes made the Round of 8 in 2022 in his standalone season for ThorSport scoring 8 Top-5s and 15 Top-10s for the Ohio based team. Tuesday marked the announcement by Bill McAnally Racing that Christian would be replacing Derek Kraus in the #19 Chevrolet for 2023 with a renewed multi-year deal with support from NAPA Auto Parts on the truck. Bill mentioned how hard it was to part from Kraus because of how good he is and how much he helped grow their Truck program.

Christian will be joined full time by 17 year old high school student Jake Garcia from Georgia in the #35 truck, a new second entry for the team. Jake will turn 18 the morning of the Vegas race so will miss the Daytona opener. There is no word on a temp driver for Daytona but the team would file a waiver for Jake to compete for the title.

The rumor mills have spun around the potential of Christian being replaced at ThorSport by none other than Hailie Deegan which has been all but confirmed by a source at ThorSport to myself and our friends over at Crew Chief's Corner and this just brings that 1 step closer. 

By: Tom Luttermoser