Fairhope’s Grant Enfinger will roll off from the 35th position in his NASCAR Cup Series debut at Sonoma Raceway on Sunday.

It was a long time coming for the South Alabama graduate, who is sitting in for Noah Gragson in Legacy Motor Club’s No. 42 Sunseeker Resort Chevrolet for the Toyota Save Mart 350 at the 2.52-mile California road course.

Gragson exhibited concussion-like symptoms in the past week after crashing in the Cup race at Worldwide Technology Raceway.

Enfinger drives the No. 23 Champion Power Equipment Chevrolet on the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series for GMS Racing, which is affiliated with Legacy. With the truck series not racing this week, Legacy tabbed Enfinger to drive for Gragson.

“I don’t think anything can kind of really prepare you for this,” Enfinger said on Saturday, “but I’ve been racing my whole life. It’s just a new racecar. I’ve very much enjoyed practice and qualifying, and I have a lot to learn for tomorrow. But I have enjoyed everything to this point.”

The 38-year-old driver got his racing start in karts at age 11 at J&J Speedway (now Sunny South Raceway) in Grand Bay. After legends and late models, Enfinger clawed his way into national-touring racing.

Enfinger got some start-and-park chances while working for Andy Belmont Racing in the ARCA Racing Series. He ran a limited ARCA schedule with a car owned by Grant Enfinger Racing, which he described as “me and another guy” and featured Enfinger as the transport driver.

Enfinger made 18 ARCA starts in three years before his first full season in 2011 followed by 14 starts in three seasons before another full-time ride, and 14 truck races across a seven-year period before a full-time chance on the series in 2017.

Along the way, Enfinger had one Cup Series opportunity. He attempted to qualify the No. 92 Hewes Concrete Polishing Chevrolet at Homestead-Miami Speedway in the final race of the 2011 season for car owner George Sinica. He didn’t make the race, and a reported partial-schedule race team for the 2012 season never materialized.

“I’ve tried to forget that, as a matter of fact,” Enfinger said on Saturday when asked about his previous Cup opportunity. “It was just a mess of a whole thing from beginning to end unfortunately. That was at the point of my career where I wouldn’t ever turn down an opportunity.”

Enfinger won the ARCA season championship in 2015 after a runner-up showing in 2014. He’s in his seventh season of full-time competition on the truck series.

The day before Gragson’s wreck at Worldwide Technology Raceway, Enfinger won the trucks series race at the Madison, Illinois, track. He also won the NASCAR trucks race at Kansas Speedway on May 6 and ranks fourth in the 2023 season standings.

But the vehicles that Enfinger drove to 16 ARCA and nine truck victories weren’t like the Cup car he’ll be piloting on Sunday.

“I’m comfortable with the track itself,” Enfinger said before Saturday’s work at Sonoma, where he raced last season in the truck series. “The biggest transition for me is obviously going to be the car and its tire. These cars obviously drive substantially different than the truck I’m used to. I think some stuff will probably be a lot different, so what I’m going to focus on in practice is just trying to get the feel for the tire more than anything. I feel like the tire and the slip and all that is completely different than what I’m used to. But there’s also simply things like the shifter and stuff like that that I want to make sure I don’t screw up.”

The No. 42 Cup team hasn’t been as successful as the No. 23 truck team this season. Gragson’s best finish in 2023 has been 12th, with five DNFs in 15 races. Gragson ranks 32nd in the season standings, next-to-last among the full-time drivers.

“I’m a Grant Enfinger fan,” said Corey LaJoie, the driver of the No. 7 Chevrolet for Spire Motorsports on the Cup Series. “Guy’s doing it the hard way. It’s cool to see him get a shot.

“And he knows it’s not going be easy, right? The 42 car hasn’t been a freaking ball of fire. It’s been more on fire than it’s been a ball of fire on speed. But it’s cool to see a guy like that grind away and get a shot.”

The Toyota Save Mart 350 starts at 2:30 p.m. CDT Saturday. FOX will televise the race.

Mark Inabinett is a sports reporter for Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter at @AMarkG1.