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WATCH: Tipsy Ben Rhodes Brings Out the Laughter at the Press Conference After Clinching Truck Series Championship

Published 11/08/2021, 3:22 AM EST

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USA Today via Reuters

On Friday night, the NASCAR Truck Series season finally wrapped up. Chandler Smith won the race ahead of Stewart Friesen, but third-placed Ben Rhodes clinched the title. Naturally, the 24-year-old was utterly thrilled to take his maiden Truck crown, though he was a little tipsy. And he wasn’t able to hide it all that well, because his speech was a little slurred and he was often repeating himself.

Fumbling along the way, Rhodes, speaking during “the weirdest press conference ever,” explained how he won the championship.

He said, “Here’s how this happened, my crew chief gave me this adjustment. Some lower air pressures, because I said, ‘Hey, this isn’t going to happen. I can’t win the race this way. They’re beating me on the restarts’. He pumped me up, didn’t work out in the second stage, took me back down.”

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Towards the end of the press conference, Rhodes noticed that his wife was looking a little embarrassed. This was likely because he had a little too much to drink in his championship celebration.

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USA Today via Reuters

What else did Ben Rhodes say?

He then set his sights on the #52 of Friesen for second place. Though he wasn’t too worried about not catching him. Third place was perfectly fine for Ben Rhodes, as he had the championship under control. He was forced to watch on as the likes of Zane Smith extended their gaps to him. Obviously, he was not in the right headspace because he had issues with his in-truck radio.

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On the bright side, he managed to overcome all of that and take the title. Rhodes also confessed that he was truly thankful to ThorSport for handing him the opportunity to compete in the Truck Series. He has been with the outfit for a fairly long time, so he was truly happy to deliver a title for them.

WATCH: Ben Rhodes Survives Frantic Finish to Triumph in NASCAR Truck Series Opener at Daytona

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Written by:

Dhruv George

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Dhruv George is a senior Motorsports author for EssentiallySports, having authored nearly 12000 articles spanning different sports like F1, NASCAR, Tennis, NFL, and eSports. He graduated with a PG Diploma in Journalism from the Xavier Institute of Communications. Dhruv has also conducted interviews with F1 driver Pierre Gasly and Moto2 rider Tony Arbolino.
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