April 27, 2024 | By Holly Cain | NASCAR
The hometown favorite, Ryan Truex prevailed in a thrilling double-overtime finish in the BetRivers 200 NASCAR Xfinity Series race Saturday at Dover (Del.) Motor Speedway, leading only the two final laps to earn back-to-back victories at the one-mile track.
The New Jersey native and defending race winner started alongside 20-year old Carson Kvapil on the front row for the final overtime re-start then pulled away to take the lead and ultimately the white flag – signaling one lap to go. An accident elsewhere on track officially ended the race under caution.
“I can’t believe it, our car was just good at the end when it mattered, I was so loose all day,” said Truex, 32, the younger brother of NASCAR Cup Series driver Martin Truex Jr.
“Shout out to Carson what an amazing run for what, his second race. I felt a little bad running him up the hill, but you’ve got to take these things when you can.
“I think I held my breath the last two laps. Love these fans. Love this track.”
While Truex hoisted and will certainly savor the Dover trophy, it was also a great day for Kvapil driving the No. 88 JR Motorsports Chevrolet. The son of former NASCAR driver Travis Kvapil, finished fourth in his only other series start – at Martinsville (Va.) Speedway earlier this year – giving him a very promising pair of top five results in as many Xfinity Series races he’s competed in.
“This is pretty incredible,” Kvapil said. “Definitely felt like we had a fast car going into the day, but to be competing for the win on a green-white-checkered is pretty amazing. We’ve been in this situation before just not quite at this level.”
For much of the final laps, the outcome looked like it was going to be decided between former Richard Childress Racing teammates, Austin Hill and Sheldon Creed. Hill, driver of the No. 21 RCR Chevrolet and Creed, who now drives the No. 18 JGR Toyota restarted door-to-door on the front row on a re-start with 11 laps remaining. As that pair raced aggressively side-by-side for the lead, Kvapil put his Chevy down low, three-wide and drove past the pair to take the lead with eight laps remaining.
On the final restart of regulation- with five laps remaining – Hill and Kvapil restarted alongside one another on the front row, but Hill spun out in tight-quarter action between them in Turn 1, necessitating overtime. Kvapil was able to fend off the field on that first re-start, only to have another caution come out. On the second re-start, he and Truex started alongside each other, but Truex was able to get around Kvapil at the start and pace the field for the final two laps.
The race was briefly halted under red flag conditions for a light rain with 34 laps remaining. Stewart-Haas Racing’s Cole Custer – who led a race best 95 of the 208 laps – was leading at the time and then decided to pit for tires and fuel during yellow flag laps just before the cars restarted. He had to restart at the tail end of the field, but the reigning series champion rallied back to a fifth-place finish – able to advance on three ensuing caution periods plus the double overtime.
JR Motorsports’ Sam Mayer finished third, with Creed fourth followed by Custer. Kaulig Racing’s A.J. Allmendinger was sixth, followed by JGR’s Chandler Smith, Kyle Weatherman Racing’s Kyle Weatherman, Our Motorsports’ Anthony Alfredo and Jordan Anderson Racing’s Parker Retzlaff.
The ninth-place finish was especially big for Alfredo, earning him the final Dash 4 Cash $100,000 prize – besting Riley Herbst, Jesse Love and Ryan Sieg – in the last of the four-race incentive program sponsored by Xfinity.
“Really coming into this race, that was our motivation, it wasn’t something to just be a part of, yeah, I mean this was huge,” Alfredo said. “You don’t understand how small our budget is compared to these bigger teams. People overlook it because we’ve been running so well. The last three weeks we’ve been running top-10, and everyone asks, ‘who’s your alliance with.’
“… Coming into this race we knew if we could pull it off, we could invest in our team to be that much better.”
JR Motorsports’ Justin Allgaier, a two-time Dover winner, won the opening stage of the race and ran up front – his 39 laps in the lead second only to Custer. He also pit in the waning laps and managed to rally back to a 17th-place finish.
Smith now leads Custer by a single point in the Xfinity Series championship standings as the series heads into an off-week. It resumes racing at the historic Darlington (S.C.) Raceway in the Royal Purple Bag Project 200 on May 11 (1:30 p.m. ET, FS1, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio). NASCAR Cup Series regular Kyle Larson is the defending race winner.
Holly Cain | NASCAR | Photo: Joe Gibbs Racing
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