Nineteen-year-old wins ARCA race at Kansas Speedway in NASCAR’s weekend opener
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- Nineteen-year-old Gio Ruggiero won Saturday’s Tide 150 in the ARCA Menards Series.
- Ruggiero’s victory followed contact with Dystany Spurlock that led to the restart.
- Kansas weekend features O’Reilly Auto Parts Series 300 Saturday, AdventHealth 400 Sunday.
On a day tailor-made for motorsports, Gio Ruggiero rose to the occasion in Kansas.
The 19-year-old New Englander drove to victory in the Saturday’s Tide 150, the first event of NASCAR’s high-octane weekend at Kansas Speedway in Kansas City, Kansas.
Temperatures sat in the low 50s with postcard-blue skies framing the asphalt oval for the midday ARCA Menards Series race. This followed a week of wild spring weather around the KC metro, which saw a couple of tornados and intermittently heavy wind and rain through Friday.
All of that Midwest mess had cleared out Saturday, setting the stage for some thrilling action on the track. It was Ruggiero’s second victory in as many ARCA starts this year; he also won at Daytona.
This win came after some contact on the tract and several restarts.
“You just gotta do whatever it takes to win, so that’s what I did,” Ruggiero said in a post-race interview on FOX, posted to the ARCA website. “I thought we had a really strong car, and I just couldn’t let these guys down and lose the race.
“My crew chief Matt Ross just had a baby and I needed to get him a nice gift ... (and) win.”
In the later laps Ruggiero’s car made contact with that of fellow driver Dystany Spurlock, leading to the race’s penultimate restart — one that worked out favorably for Ruggiero.
Spurlock is a fantastic story in her own right, as she is the first Black woman to drive in a national-level race of this caliber. The ARCA Menards Series is NASCAR’s feeder circuit for rides in the O’Reilly Auto Parts and NASCAR Cup series.
The O’Reilly Auto Parts Series’ Kansas Lottery 300 was next up on Saturday’s itinerary at Kansas Speedway. Taylor Gray won the 200-lap race ahead of runner-up Sheldon Creed.
The NASCAR Cup Series’ AdventHealth 400, the weekend’s marquee race, is scheduled for Sunday at 1 p.m. It will be broadcast live on FOX.
This is the first of NASCAR’s two race weekends at Kansas Speedway. The track’s second major racing weekend of 2026 is set for late September.
This story was originally published April 18, 2026 at 2:45 PM.