‘Going to make that tradition,’ Kaden Honeycutt plots new celebration plans after Watkins Glen win

The NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series witnessed a massive milestone on Friday night as Kaden Honeycutt secured his first career victory with a dramatic overtime pass at Watkins Glen International. He capped off the triumph with a viral beer-chugging celebration that is already being billed as a permanent fixture.

The breakthrough moment carries massive weight for the 22-year-old TRICON Garage driver. He not only outdueled a pair of heavy road-course favorites in the final laps but also secured a Friday sweep after winning the ARCA Menards Series race earlier in the afternoon. The victory in the Bully Hill Vineyards 176 at The Glen vaulted him to the top of the Truck Series championship standings.

Following the chaotic finish and his impromptu front-stretch antics, Honeycutt addressed the media regarding his immediate post-race reactions, with Sportskeeda and the Elmira Star-Gazette reporting that the Texas native fully intends to perfect his admittedly flawed beer-shotgunning technique for future trips to victory lane. “It actually tasted like water,” Honeycutt told reporters during his post-race press conference. “I might actually have to do that more often, but I think I’m going to make that tradition now. But I just need to get a little bit more perfected. I didn’t shotgun it the greatest. I wish I had actually had an actual opener. But apparently, they were telling me to bite it. So, I was like, oh crap, I didn’t do that. So like I said, I got to work on that a little bit.”

Beyond the suds on the asphalt, the raw emotion of the moment was palpable. This was Honeycutt’s 67th career start in the Truck Series, a grinding journey of near-misses, underfunded equipment in early years, and the constant pressure to prove he belonged at the national level. Stepping out of his No. 11 Safelite + Foster Love Toyota, the realization of what he had just accomplished finally hit him. He had just taken down Connor Zilisch and Shane van Gisbergen, two drivers widely considered generational talents when turning left and right.

1. Defying the Road Course Odds

2. The Overtime Thriller

The final stage of the race devolved into a chaotic demolition derby, setting the stage for Honeycutt’s heroics. Multiple late-race incidents brought out four cautions over the final 13 scheduled laps. At the front of the pack, the leaders began to crack under the pressure. Ross Chastain and Giovanni Riggiero both incurred penalties for jumping the restart, effectively removing them from contention. Chastain’s day went from bad to worse when Ty Majeski spun him out shortly after. Through the carnage, Connor Zilisch looked poised to take the checkered flag. The highly touted prospect had led a race-high 28 laps and seemed to have the field covered. But the string of yellow flags dragged the race into a two-lap overtime shootout, giving Honeycutt one final shot at the leader. When the green flag dropped for the final time, Zilisch made a split-second tactical decision that would haunt him. He chose the top lane for the restart, hoping to avoid the aggressive dive-bombs that Watkins Glen’s Turn 1 is famous for. Honeycutt happily took the bottom, and as they barreled into the ninety-degree right-hander, the No. 11 Toyota pounced. “I think Zilisch missed a shift a little bit,” Honeycutt explained of the race-winning move. “We were three wide going into Turn 1 and I barely got to his right rear and touched him a little bit. It was just enough to get on by him.” Honeycutt cleared Zilisch out of the carousel and never looked back, aggressively attacking the curbing through the bus stop and the final few corners to win by a comfortable margin of 0.902 seconds. Zilisch crossed the line in second, followed closely by Cup Series regular Shane van Gisbergen in third. Daniel Hemric and Chandler Smith rounded out the top five.

3. A Bitter Pill for the Runner-Up

For Zilisch, the defeat was a bitter pill to swallow. The young phenom was making his first start at Watkins Glen since a terrifying victory lane fall the previous August left him with a broken collarbone. He had the fastest truck for the majority of the evening but ultimately couldn’t hold off the hard-charging Honeycutt on the final restart. “Just an unfortunate way to end that race,” a dejected Zilisch told reporters on pit road. “I chose the top on the last restart, hoping we could get through there without making contact. I knew the bottom would be better if that happened, but I didn’t want to be that guy. I wish I could go back and redo it and just pick the inside and do that. It is what it is.” Zilisch’s frustration was compounded by the general confusion surrounding the restart zone throughout the race, an issue that had plagued several veterans, including Chastain. Regardless of the circumstances, the final lap showed a stark contrast in aggression: Zilisch played it safe, and Honeycutt seized the moment. While the overtime pass was clinical, the ensuing celebration was a comedy of errors. After doing burnouts, Honeycutt parked his truck on the front stretch and grabbed a beer to celebrate with the New York crowd. His plan was to scale the catch fence and share the moment with the fans in the grandstands, mimicking the legendary celebrations of Tony Stewart and Helio Castroneves. Logistics, however, got in the way. “I really wanted to get through the gate and go up there with the stands and celebrate with them,” Honeycutt said with a laugh. “But I think they had the gate locked. I was there. Someone goes, ‘hey, go up the flagstand.’ I was like, absolutely not, I’m not gonna die, so…” Stranded on the track side of the fence, Honeycutt settled for shotgunning the can in front of the locked gate. Without a key or a proper tool to puncture the aluminum, he fumbled the execution, but the crowd roared in approval anyway. The moment instantly went viral on social media. With his first career victory in the books, Honeycutt now turns his attention to the remainder of the season with a completely different outlook. He suddenly holds a 29-point advantage over Chandler Smith in the championship standings.

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