Elliott Sadler 2017 Season Recap

Elliott Sadler, driver of the No. 1 Chevrolet for JR Motorsports, finished second in the NASCAR Xfinity Series standings. Here are the highlights from his season.

In addition to running for the NASCAR Xfinity Series championship, Sadler was called upon to compete for Tommy Baldwin in both Daytona Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series races and the spring Talladega race. Running his 14th Daytona 500, Sadler finished 20th.

Away from the track Sadler has taken an active role with children Wyatt and Austyn, which includes coaching sports.

Sadler celebrated his 800th career NASCAR national series start in June at Iowa Speedway.

With the fastest lap (165.283 mph) at Indianapolis, Sadler not only claimed his first, and only, pole of the season, but his first since March 2014 at Auto Club Speedway.

The No. 1 was a staple at the front of the NASCAR Xfinity Series field. Sadler earned the best average finish among series regulars at 9.4 and had 25 top-10 finishes in 33 races. Other categories Sadler led were driver rating (98.3), average running position (8.834), laps in the top 15 (91.9 percent), percentage of laps run on the lead lap (96.77), quality passes, and fastest drivers late in a run.

Like last year, Sadler was the best driver at the end of the NASCAR Xfinity Series regular season. But this time he was awarded for his efforts after the race at Chicagoland Speedway with a trophy for the regular season title and 15 additional playoff points.

Hope for his first championship was lost when Sadler felt he was held up by Ryan Preece in the season finale in Miami. Teammate William Byron drove away from Sadler late in the going and Sadler finished as the championship runner-up for the fourth time in his career.

For the second straight year and the third time in his career, Sadler ended the season as the NASCAR Xfinity Series most popular driver.