After a short-lived Chicago cameo earlier this year, the Supercars regular made just his second start in US stock car racing’s second division at Portland.
Perkins impressed on his return, setting the fourth fastest time in practice before going on to qualify 11th in the #19 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota Supra.
The 39-year-old worked his way through the field to be running sixth for the penultimate restart of the race with eight laps remaining.
There were chaotic scenes on the resumption of racing, and Perkins surged to third with five laps to go.
However, his time in the podium position was short. Perkins lost control of his car exiting the Turn 11 chicane and wound up bogged in the run-off at Turn 12.
That brought out the caution and an early end to Perkins’ day, who was classified 31st.
Speaking with Speedcafe, Perkins offered an honest and emotional assessment of his day.
“Either I made probably one of the biggest mistakes of my career, or it’s jammed in two gears because I couldn’t get a gear to get [the car] going,” said Perkins.
“But I’m not going to say that that was the car’s fault. We just can’t change the result now. It’s either my mistake or potentially something happened there on the downshift.
“It was all under control. We were so fast through that section of the track today.
“It’s just gut-wrenching to come within five laps of a potential podium finish. That would have been awesome, but it didn’t happen, and we can only move on from it.”
The No. 19 of Jack Perkins gets stuck off-track and we’re going to have a late #XfinitySeries restart (or multiple) to decide this one. pic.twitter.com/bPQ1zYn0yH
— Xfinity Racing (@XfinityRacing) August 31, 2025
Perkins had shown impressive pace throughout the contest, matching the speed of race leader and eventual winner Connor Zilisch at times during Stage 2.
The Australian said he didn’t have the ultimate pace that the race leaders had at the beginning of each run, but was able to be competitive over the long haul.
“We just made good decisions all day,” Perkins said.
“There was one restart I lost one spot, but every other restart I gained two spots, maybe one spot. One restart, I got three spots.
“I just felt like I made the right decisions, which doesn’t always happen. There’s a bit of luck involved, but I knew the aggression level was high. These guys race so hard.
“I’ve been watching this stuff since I first came over here in 2008 to watch (Marocs) Ambrose. I knew it was going to be wild and just tried to position the car in all the right places.
“I think we probably had the speed to be top two or three based on our long run pace.
“It was hard to pass, it was hard to drive, and hard to keep it consistent and not make mistakes.
“I’ll hopefully be able to watch the race back one day and be proud of what we did.”
Perkins’ program was backed by a slew of Australian supporters, whom he thanked but felt he didn’t deliver for.
“I’m just so grateful for Earl (Evans) from Shaw and Partners and Steve (Blackmore) from Southern Cross Truck Rentals — everyone that’s helped us out,” said Perkins.
“I feel like I’ve let them down, but I’m obviously just so grateful for the opportunities.”
As it stands, Perkins has no plans beyond this year to return to the United States, whether that be in NASCAR or otherwise.
It was a bittersweet end to the US sojourn. Perkins felt he had not realised his full potential, but believes he went some way to proving his doubters wrong.
“Every time we announced a race or something, you cop a fair bit of negative flak on social media, which I try not to read,” he said.
“Everyone tells you you’re useless and you can’t drive and you’re this and you’re that and it just would have been nice to get a result from that point of view.
“I say this quite a lot, I know what I can do in a race car, but more importantly, I know what I can’t do.
“I was very proud of how it was all travelling today, and I’ve just thoroughly enjoyed the whole Joe Gibbs Racing experience working with Seth (Chavka) the crew chief and Todd (Zeigler) the car chief.
“The whole time, I was pinching myself at the opportunity. I’ll be forever grateful and in debt to those who made it happen for me. So it would have just been awesome to get a result – but anyway, we didn’t, and we just move on.”
Perkins’ attention will switch to Supercars, where he’ll partner James Courtney at the Blanchard Racing Team for The Bend 500 and Bathurst 1000.
For more of the latest NASCAR news stories, visit MotorRacing.com
Discussion about this post