Kaz Grala to make NASCAR return with three-race Xfinity deal

Kaz Grala has agreed to compete in a three-race deal with Sam Hunt Racing in the NASCAR Xfinity Series. The 26-year-old will run three road course races later this year, driving the No. 24 Toyota Supra for the team.

Grala’s first race will be the Chicago Street Course on July 5th. He will also run at Watkins Glen on August 9th and the Charlotte Roval on October 4th. Overplay Games will serve as the primary sponsor, fully backing the effort.

Through the first part of the 2025 season, Grala has been absent from the grid, but he has plenty of experience. Grala ran 24 of the 36 Cup races on the schedule in 2024, running most of those races with Rick Ware Racing.

He last raced in the Xfinity Series in 2023 where he ran full-time with Sam Hunt Racing, so this is a bit of a reunion for the two. Along with 31 career Cup starts and 77 career Xfinity starts, he also has 51 starts in the Truck Series. He actually won the 2017 NASCAR Truck Series season-opener at Daytona International Speedway (where he became the youngest winner in Daytona history), which is his only win in one of the three national levels of the sport.

Grala is a solid road racer, earning a top ten in his Cup Daytona as a fill-in driver for Austin Dillon, which came at the Daytona Road Course. Of his seven top fives in the Xfinity Series, four of them also came at road courses.