Noah Gragson finished third in the UNOH 188 at the DAYTONA Road Course at Daytona International Speedway Road Course on Saturday.
Gragson’s top-five finish, the ninth time he has achieved that result this year, added 43 points to his season total. He ranks third in the NASCAR Xfinity Series with 740 total points.
Gragson started and finished in the third position and led one lap in the race. The third-year driver has secured two career victories, with 19 top-five finishes and 37 results inside the top 10.
The Las Vegas, Nevada native’s starting and finishing positions compared favorably to his career averages, starting six spots higher than his career mark of 9.4 and completing the race five places ahead of his 7.7 career average finish.
Gragson’s third-place finish was against a field of 38 drivers. The race endured seven cautions and eight caution laps. There were seven lead changes.
Austin Cindric earned the victory in the race, followed by Brandon Jones in second place. Behind Gragson’s third-place finish, AJ Allmendinger brought home fourth, and Andy Lally closed the top five.
After Cindric won the first stage, Chase Briscoe drove the No. 98 car to victory in Stage 2.
Josh Bilicki finished 12th in the UNOH 188 at the DAYTONA Road Course at Daytona International Speedway Road Course on Saturday after heading into the race with an average finish position of 22.5 this season.
Bilicki’s result added 25 points to his season total. Bilicki now ranks 32nd in the NASCAR Xfinity Series standings with 97 points.
Bilicki started in 19th position and led one lap in the race. The fifth-year driver has never finished inside the top 10 in his career.
The Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin native’s starting and finishing positions compared favorably to his career averages, starting 12 spots higher than his career mark of 30.8 and completing the race 16 places ahead of his 28.4 career average finish.
Bilicki battled against a field of 38 drivers on the way to his 12th-place finish. The race endured seven cautions and eight caution laps. Prior to the checkered flag there were seven lead changes.
Austin Cindric secured the victory in the race, and Brandon Jones finished second. Noah Gragson crossed the finish line third, AJ Allmendinger secured fourth, and Andy Lally closed out the top five.
After Cindric won Stage 1, Chase Briscoe drove the No. 98 car to victory in Stage 2.
Pressed into duty as an emergency call-up, Kaz Grala had plenty of pinch-me moments in his NASCAR Cup Series debut.
The Saturday morning call to suit up, coming from NASCAR Hall of Famer and team owner Richard Childress. The fitting for the iconic No. 3 car at the racing epicenter of Daytona International Speedway. Looking in his mirror in pace laps and seeing the No. 48 of childhood hero Jimmie Johnson in the row behind him. The brief moment atop the scoring pylon in the final stage. Oh, and with no practice or qualifying beforehand.
It all added up to a dream sequence for the 21-year-old Grala, who finished an impressive seventh in his first race in NASCAR’s big leagues in the series’ first event on the Daytona Road Course. The result came just a day after getting Childress’ message that he’d be the Sunday substitute for Austin Dillon, who missed the Daytona event after reporting a positive COVID-19 test Saturday morning.
“Well, as far as sinking in, I’ll have to get back with you on that maybe sometime midweek, but the last 24 hours a lot of things have moved very quickly,” said Grala, who has made just two Xfinity Series starts for RCR this season, including a fourth place last weekend at Road America — a finish, he said, probably made him a stronger pick as a fill-in option. “It’s certainly been overwhelming. But I did, as you said, took my time on the grid and on the pace laps to really soak it in and understand the gravity of that moment. It’s unbelievable to be racing in the Cup Series under any circumstances, but to do it in the No. 3 car was just incredible.
“I personally drove the No. 3 car in Bandoleros, Legends Cars, late models. I took it even all the way up to the NASCAR K&N Pro Series because it was my dad’s number. The No. 3 has held a really special place in my heart for my whole career. Never in my wildest dreams would I have thought my Cup debut would come in it, but I’m so grateful to Richard and everybody at Richard Childress Racing for believing in me and trusting me behind the wheel of one of their Cup cars because that’s their main business right there, so it was an honor to know that they trust me behind the wheel.”
Grala said he planned to ease into Sunday’s Go Bowling 235, adapting to the drivability of a Cup Series car and getting a feel for the adjusted pedals, which had fit the slightly shorter Dillon. He also dropped to the rear of the field from the car’s scheduled 10th-place starting spot because of the driver change.
By the end of the first stage, Grala had found some rhythm, telling the No. 3 crew over the team communications: “I like this car. This is fun!” By the final stage, he benefited from a longer-haul pit strategy cycle to head to the top of the board. Grala incredulously radioed his crew to ask if he was leading. He set the pace for three laps before making a scheduled pit stop.
Once the field lined up for a final restart with three laps to go, Grala lined up 13th. Fighting through muscle cramps in the late going, he jumped six spots to secure a solid top-10 result at the checkers.
Grala hopes Dillon will be able to return for next weekend’s Cup Series doubleheader at Dover International Speedway, but Grala was also unsure whether he’d be on call as the No. 3 Chevy’s potential backup. If nothing else, he proved a capable interim fix who far exceeded the modest top-30 goal he’d set for himself before Sunday’s debut.
“To be in their car with the No. 3 on the side was just crazy,” Grala said, “and to put it in the top 10, I’m really happy about that and hope that it gave Austin something to cheer for from home.”
No practice, no qualifying, new course — no problem for Hendrick Motorsports driver Chase Elliott.
The 24-year-old Elliott gave a not-so-subtle reminder Sunday afternoon in the NASCAR Cup Series debut on the Daytona International Speedway Road Course that he is one of the sport’s very best on the technical road circuits, even sight unseen as was the case this week.
Just before a caution flag with five laps remaining, Elliott had pulled out to a 10-second advantage on the field. He turned in a fantastic restart and drove three perfect final laps in his No. 9 Chevrolet to hold off Denny Hamlin by .202 seconds to win the GoBowling 235. It was Elliott’s third consecutive road-course win dating back to last year.
“Just had a really good car more than anything, not sure I did anything special today,” Elliott said. “Really fortunate from that standpoint. Had a good week of preparation and came out and really executed on the race.”
Elliott said he was hardly surprised about the late-race restart and prepared for it.
“To me was not when, but how many green-white-checkers we were going to have to do in a row and being better at executing those,” Elliott said. “Any win at Daytona is special. (Crew chief) Alan (Gustafson) and I were joking that we had to change it to a road course to win at Daytona. … Just a great day.”
Hamlin’s Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Martin Truex Jr. finished third followed by seven-time NASCAR Cup Series champion Jimmie Johnson and Chris Buescher. Clint Bowyer, Kaz Grala (who was substituting for Austin Dillon in the No. 3 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet), William Byron, Joey Logano and Michael McDowell completed the top 10 in a race so smooth and expertly handled that it more closely resembled an age-old venue than a first-time visit on a challenging 3.61-mile, 14-turn course.
“Let’s make sure we don’t look like a bunch of dummies there in Turn 1,” Hamlin said of a pre-race conversation with fellow drivers about the new venue. “We made sure we kept it clean to start and then you can get your bearings about you after you run a few laps. Really, it’s one of the those tracks where it’s not super technical but it definitely rewards the guys that do the right techniques on road courses.”
The veteran NASCAR Cup Series drivers immediately put on a driving display that seemed as if they had long raced on the circuit — which includes a tight infield road course as well as Daytona’s more famous high-banked turns.
Elliott has proven himself a road-course favorite even though he’s only in his fifth full-time season. He led the most laps — 34 of the 65 — and won the first stage on Sunday with Hamlin winning the second stage. Outside of regular pit stops, Elliott was either leading or about to lead all afternoon, resulting in Elliott’s eighth career win and second of the season — matching a victory in May at Charlotte Motor Speedway.
“I just wanted to keep him honest and it seemed like the closer we got the more his car was either wheel-hopping or sliding the front tires, so we were at least keeping him honest there to make him push his car and earn the victory,” said Hamlin, a five-race winner in 2020 and driver of the No. 11 Toyota.
Championship points leader and six-race winner Kevin Harvick had an eventful day in the No. 4 Stewart-Haas Racing Ford — contact with another car while running near the front and then another spin later in the race. He finished 17th but still leads the championship by 118 points over Hamlin.
Only three races remain to set the 16-driver NASCAR Playoffs field. Byron is in the 16th position with a 25-point edge over Hendrick Motorsports teammate Johnson and a 35-point advantage over 18th-place Erik Jones with a doubleheader weekend scheduled next week on the 1-mile Dover International Speedway before the series returns to the Daytona 2.5-mile superspeedway for the regular-season finale.
Note: Inspection in the NASCAR Cup Series garage resulted in no major issues. The No. 4 of Kevin Harvick and the No. 19 of Martin Truex Jr. each had one lug nut not safe and secure in post-race inspection.
The 2020 struggles for reigning NASCAR Cup Series champion Kyle Busch continued Sunday at the Daytona International Speedway Road Course.
Busch closed out the inaugural Go Bowling 235 with his fifth finish outside the top 30 this season, placing 37th on the final scorecard. He only had two races go that way in 2019.
On top of that, the Daytona Road Course marked Busch’s fourth event this season in which he did not make it to the checkered flag. There were also only two races like that in all of 2019.
Sunday’s series of unfortunate events started on Lap 2 of 65. Busch took the lead but then dragged the tires on his No. 18 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota in the front chicane. He flat-spotted his left-front tire, forcing him to make an unscheduled pit stop on Lap 4.
Busch was 27th at the end of Stage 1 on Lap 15 and then up to 19th when Stage 2 ended on Lap 30.
Things were fine until Busch pitted on Lap 48 from the second-place position with a completely different issue that needed to be diagnosed. The No. 18 crew took a longer stop than normal, furiously wrenching on Busch’s Toyota. Instead of sending the two-time champ back out on the track, he was told to steer his car to the garage with a mechanical issue.
With less than 20 laps remaining and the laps continuing to tick off, however, JGR didn’t have much time to spare. Busch ultimately returned to the race six laps down … only to exit early regardless.
On Lap 60, both of Busch’s rear tires went down, sending the Camry spinning. That incident officially ended his day.
It was in Busch’s best interest to finish out the event for points purposes. He has yet to win a race this season and therefore is not guaranteed a spot in the playoffs. Busch does have a comfortable 100-point cushion above the cutline in 13th, but — again — not guaranteed a berth.
Just three regular-season races remain, including a return trip to Daytona for the finale on its high-speed oval that tends to be unpredictable. That’ll be more familiar than the road course — even though Busch had the most recent experience among drivers on the layout stemming from the Rolex 24 earlier this year.
Before that last-ditch effort, Dover International Speedway will host a doubleheader next weekend (Saturday and Sunday both at 4 p.m. ET on NBCSN, MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio). Busch has three wins in 30 career starts at the “Monster Mile” — most recently in 2017. He came in sixth and 10th there last year.
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Monday, Aug. 17
2:30 a.m., NASCAR Gander RV & Outdoors Truck Series: Sunoco 159 (re-air), FS1/FOX Sports App
6 p.m., NASCAR Race Hub, FS1/FOX Sports App
Tuesday, Aug. 18
1:30 a.m., IMSA Auto Racing Special Lamborghini Super Trofeo: Road America, NBCSN/NBC Sports App
6 p.m., NASCAR Race Hub, FS1/FOX Sports App
On MRN
7 p.m., NASCAR Live
Wednesday, Aug. 19 12:30 a.m., Glory Road: Stock Car Evolution, NBCSN/NBC Sports App
5 p.m., Dale Jr. Download, NBCSN/NBC Sports App
6 p.m., NASCAR Race Hub, FS1/FOX Sports App
Sheldon Creed had to hold off his GMS Racing teammate, Brett Moffitt, twice on restarts with less than five laps remaining in Sunday’s Sunoco 159, with the 22-year-old Creed ultimately beating the former series champion by a mere .743 seconds in overtime to earn the inaugural NASCAR Gander RV & Outdoors Truck Series race victory at Daytona International Speedway’s famed road course.
Appropriately, Creed and Moffitt dominated the top position on the scoring pylon all day – combining to lead 32 of the race’s 46 laps. There were seven race leaders and 11 lead changes, but Creed topped all drivers with 22 laps out front en route to his second series victory. Ironically, Creed’s first career win at Kentucky Speedway earlier this season came when the race was shortened due to weather. On Sunday, he won having to lead extra laps, including those last intense 12 laps.
Sunoco rookie Raphael Lessard finished a career-best third, followed by 2019 series champion Matt Crafton and current championship points leader Austin Hill. Tyler Ankrum finished sixth, and the season’s other two-time race winner Grant Enfinger was seventh. Parker Kligerman, Scott Lagasse Jr. and Stewart Friesen rounded out the top 10 in order.
It was quite a comeback for both Enfinger and Friesen, whose trucks spent extended time on pit road for repairs earlier in the race. For Lagasse, a cancer survivor, it was a particularly impressive afternoon – his ninth-place work came in his only Gander Trucks start on the year.
For winning the first race in the Triple Truck Challenge incentive, Creed receives a $50,000 bonus check. The series will compete again for the extra money at Dover International Speedway next week and then Aug. 30 at World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway. Should a driver win two of these races, he earns a $150,000 paycheck. Should he win all three, he would earn a $500,000 bonus.
“Nerve-wracking,” a smiling Creed said after climbing out of his No. 2 GMS Racing Chevrolet. “Brett’s really good on road courses and he’s helped me so much on the Chevy simulator. I just thought about not making a mistake there. He tried crossing me up a couple times there in (Turns) 3 and 5 and I just stopped in the corners so he couldn’t get the run.
“I’m so thankful for my guys. They’ve been working really hard. We’ve had a rough couple weeks, last weekend running up front and lost an alternator.”
Of the extra money he won?
“Man, if I get to keep it, that will be rad,” the California native said. “Just thankful to be here and for this opportunity. Just trying to make a name for myself.”
It was a big day for several others in the field – especially those still looking for a playoff position with only four races remaining to set the 10-driver championship field.
Moffitt’s runner-up showing only solidified his position despite not having a victory yet. He is 84 points up on all drivers without a win. Ankrum is ninth in the championship standings five points ahead of 11th-place Derek Kraus. Todd Gilliland is 10th in the standings, only two points ahead of Kraus.
The Gander Trucks are back in action Friday at Dover for the KDI Office Technology 200 (5 p.m. ET on FS1, MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
Note: Sheldon Creed’s No. 2 GMS Racing Chevrolet passed NASCAR’s post-race inspection at the Daytona International Speedway Road Course. There were no other issues.
Justin Allgaier’s season of frustration bubbled over in a post-race rant Saturday after a run-in with veteran AJ Allmendinger in the NASCAR Xfinity Series’ debut at the Daytona International Speedway Road Course.
Allgaier and Allmendinger were both running among the top five in the inaugural UNOH 188 when Allmendinger overshot the entry to Turn 6 on the 3.61-mile circuit with three laps to go. His lock-up forced the No. 16 Kaulig Racing Chevrolet into Allgaier’s No. 7 JR Motorsports Chevy, looping him out of the groove.
Allmendinger drove on to finish fourth. Allgaier righted his car and took ninth place, but he marched over to confront Allmendinger after the checkered flag.
Allmendinger tried to soothe the situation by accepting fault, but Allgaier stayed on the offensive, saying, “That’s just dumb.” Allmendinger countered: “It was a mistake, and I’ve seen you make a lot of them.”
Once the trading of words ended, Allmendinger reiterated he was to blame in their on-track contact.
“I mean, he should be mad. That’s my fault,” Allmendinger told NBC Sports. “It wasn’t anything intentional, but that was my fault. I got in there trying to get under (Andy) Lally, and honestly I didn’t even drive it in that hard. I had the Lally pass done, and as soon as I touched the brake pedal, it started wheel-hopping, and as soon as it did, I was trying to clear out of the way, like I was trying to turn right to get away from the 7 and miss him. I got into him, so he should be mad, and I apologized to his race team.
“He says I’ve wrecked him a lot in the past. I’m not really sure of that. If that’s the case, I’m sorry.”
Allgaier’s remarks stemmed not only from what was an unforced error on Allmendinger’s part, but also a 2020 season that has been among the most irksome of his career. Though he’s well within the comfort zone in the Xfinity Series playoff picture thanks to 10 top-10 finishes in 19 races, he has yet to visit Victory Lane this year. Adding to the frustration level, five of his races have been cut short by crashes, mostly of the late-race variety.
Allgaier’s road-race start didn’t end early Saturday, but the sting was still painful.
“Getting wrecked, plain and simple,” Allgaier told NBCSN. “He just made a dumb, dumb decision. Obviously I’ve not seen a replay, but it’s pretty easy to tell what happened. I don’t know if we could’ve held him off at the end of the race there, but he just drove in there and cleaned me out. Really proud of everybody on this Brandt Agriculture Camaro. We weren’t the best today, the guys did a really good job and made big gains all day, and the pit crew did a great job of getting track position. Spotters did awesome, just getting me in the right spots.”
Allgaier then paused, gave a half-chuckle and shook his head.
“2020 has been just like that right there, and I’m over it,” he said. “It’s not the first time AJ’s wrecked me, and it’s just hard when the same guy wrecks you over and over again.”
The NASCAR Cup Series will embark on its maiden voyage Sunday on the historic Daytona International Speedway Road Course, bringing yet another set of twists and turns (14 of them, in fact) to an already unpredictable 2020 season.
Did we mention they’ll be taking the green flag with no practice or qualifying, too? That’s enough to add to the intrigue of what is bound to be a wild weekend, but if that wasn’t enough, the playoffs are right around the corner, with plenty of implications on the line this weekend.
NASCAR.com has you covered for this premier event from every conceivable angle. Read our full coverage below to get ready for the Go Bowling 235 (3 p.m. ET, NBC/NBC Sports App, MRN, Sirius XM NASCAR).
Austin Cindric’s summer of dominance continued Saturday afternoon in the inaugural UNOH 188 NASCAR Xfinity Series race at the Daytona International Speedway Road Course.
Cindric, 22, of Mooresville, N.C., earned his fifth victory in the last six races, his No. 22 Team Penske Ford pulling away to a hefty 7.108-second win over Brandon Jones’ No. 19 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota. That impressive ultimate margin of victory, however, is not indicative of the action-packed debut on Daytona’s famed road course.
Noah Gragson recovered from an off-course excursion early in the race while leading the field to finish third and maintain a perfect record of top-10 finishes on every Xfinity Series road-course event he has competed in. AJ Allmendinger and Andy Lally – both road-course experts – finished fourth and fifth, respectively.
Jeremy Clement, Sunoco rookies Riley Herbst and Harrison Burton, veteran Justin Allgaier and rookie Myatt Snider rounded out the top 10 in well-earned, masterful drives to the finish.
Allgaier and Allmendinger had words on pit road after the race. Allmendinger spun Allgaier out of a top-five finish in the closing laps and was apologetic. Allgaier, one of the series-best road-course racers, approached Allmendinger after the race and shared his displeasure.
With no practice or qualifying and most of the competitors in the race completely new to the 3.61-mile, 14-turn course, the race was a steady dose of high-speed how-do-you-do. From overly ambitious restarts to simply missing corners while figuring out this brand-new competitive experience, there was action from green to checkered flags.
“I’m not sure anyone was really all that happy with their race cars you know, unfortunately I have the perspective of driving really fast race cars at this track,” said Cindric, who has competed in three Rolex 24 at Daytona IMSA WeatherTech Sportscar Championship races on the road course.
“It’s a great credit to my team, MoneyLion and the guys. … That’s five wins on the year obviously back-to-back now. I didn’t feel like I drove my best today but we executed there at the end when it counts and that’s what makes these races so difficult to win.”
Chris Graythen | Getty Images
Cindric, who led 21 of the 52 total laps, led the opening 16 laps of the race to earn the Stage 1 win and bookended the work by leading the last five laps to claim his seventh career Xfinity Series victory. His five wins (and a second place) in the last six races ties a record held by the legendary Sam Ard set back in 1983.
Cindric’s chief rival – as has been the case all season – was fellow Ford driver Chase Briscoe, who led a race-best 26 laps. Cindric and Briscoe put on a master class of road-course dueling particularly in the second stage, with Briscoe, also a five-race winner in 2020, earning the green-and-white checkered flag in that sprint.
Their battle – at times contentious, with Cindric tossing a water bottle toward Briscoe’s car under caution – continued late in the race until Briscoe was collected in a multi-car restart melee with eight laps remaining. Briscoe’s No. 98 Stewart-Haas Racing Ford suffered too much damage to continue, and he was scored 29th – his worst finish of the year.
Similarly, another two of the Xfinity Series championship contenders, Kaulig Racing teammates Justin Haley and Ross Chastain simultaneously suffered race-ending issues – Haley with an off-course excursion and Chastain, a mechanical issue. They finished 36th (Chastain) and 38th (Haley) – their worst finishes of the season as well.
With seven races remaining to set the 12-driver Xfinity Series playoff field, Cindric, Briscoe, Gragson, Jones, Burton and Haley have assured their chances at a title with victories.
Brandon Brown, who suffered a tough 34th-place finish, holds the final 12th-place transfer position in the driver standings but is only 28 points up on Saturday’s sixth-place finisher Jeremy Clements in 13th.
The race provided a preview for Sunday’s doubleheader of Gander RV & Outdoors Truck Series and Cup Series events, with the Xfinity Series field encountering trouble spots multiple times in the two chicanes. Turn 1 also proved difficult in late-race restarts with multiple tie-ups and instances of drivers running wide as they dove into the infield section.
The race was delayed by one hour, 50 minutes by lightning strikes just before pre-race ceremonies. When the race did start at 5:09 p.m. ET, NASCAR officials deemed the track damp, giving teams the option to add rain tires after the late-afternoon showers.
The Xfinity Series is set for a pair of races next weekend at Dover International Speedway, Saturday at 12:30 p.m. ET and Sunday at 1:30 p.m. ET. Both races are scheduled to be broadcast on NBCSN/NBC Sports App, MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio.
Note: Post-race inspection in the NASCAR Xfinity Series garage was completed with no issues.
