AJ Allmendinger won the NASCAR Xfinity Series’ Drive for the Cure 250 at the Charlotte Motor Speedway ROVAL Saturday, Oct. 8.
Allmendinger took the lead from Ty Gibbs on an overtime restart to earn his fourth-consecutive victory at the ROVAL.
Though Allmendinger led most of stage one, his car handled differently when in traffic and only found himself at the front in stage three. However, he was able to regain the lead from Gibbs to take his fifth win of the year.
“It’s unbelievable,” Allmendinger said after the race. “Thank you everybody. All the credit goes to the men and women at Kaulig Racing. This Nutrien Ag Solutions Chevy was pretty good but Ty was really good there at the end. I didn’t know if I was going to be able to get him. I knew if I could just get to one restart on the outside of him, at least we had a chance. …
“I was frustrated, didn’t think we had a shot, but I’m always going to put it on my back when it’s time to go and we got that one. We stole that one.”
Gibbs held off Noah Gragson, who crashed in practice and started from the back, to take second. The No. 9 was third, James Davison was fourth and Justin Allgaier rounded out the top five.
Alex Labbe, Brandon Jones, Josh Berry, Ryan Sieg and Landon Cassill took positions six through 10, respectively.
All throughout the field, drivers encountered several issues. Early on, Daniel Hemric hit the tire barrier in the infield right about the same spot that Ross Chastain did in NASCAR Cup Series qualifying.
Then on lap 10, Kris Wright crashed hard in turn 1. The car didn’t turn enough and he hit the wall just past the tires. The damage was too severe for him to get back on track, leaving Wright out of the race early.
As the laps wound down in stage one (and after Labbe pitted with a sign stuck to his front bumper), Cassill and Allgaier spun around together in the infield. Neither driver hit anything, though, and continued on.
Allmendinger won stage one and pitted during the break along with Gibbs and other leaders. Among those was Austin Hill, who reported power steering issues. Both Hill and Gibbs locked themselves into the next round after the first two stages.
Shortly after the start of stage two, Brad Perez got spun around and Andy Lally got into Bayley Currey from behind, causing damage to Lally’s right front.
Jones ended up taking stage two after those in front of him pitted before the end of the segment. He then pitted during the caution, allowing Sheldon Creed and Gibbs to get back to the front.
The mayhem wasn’t over in stage three, starting with Jeb Burton on lap 46. He was turned in the infield portion of the track and was tagged on the side by Marco Andretti, who didn’t see him until it was too late.
Marco Andretti's NASCAR debut ends early.
Jeb Burton spins, and Andretti didn't know his car was sitting on the track. #NASCAR pic.twitter.com/snSCaxgQpQ
— NASCAR on NBC (@NASCARonNBC) October 8, 2022
Andretti said over the radio he thought he hurt his wrist again. He broke it in the Camping World SRX Series season finale and had surgery on it. He later told the Performance Racing Network he “tweaked his wrist a little.”
On the ensuing restart, Riley Herbst’s day went downhill as James Davison ran into Herbst’s left rear. Both cars had major damage, but only Davison elected to pit for repairs.
Later that same lap, Preston Pardus got spun by Kaz Grala on the backstretch. Pardus ended up hitting the inside wall and backed over the curb.
After the next restart, Herbst spun and lost more spots in the backstretch chicane. He lost what was left of his tire, and the caution came out for debris. Allgaier also had another issue, as he ran into a sign. It fell off after he slowed down behind the No. 45 of Stefan Parsons.
Things went very south for the No. 98 after the race went back to green again. Grala, Currey, Patrick Gallagher, Herbst and several others ended up piling into the wall in turn 2.
Just before the caution came out for that melee, Sage Karam spun Creed while in the infield.
The field went back to green on lap 62, with Gibbs out front. However, two laps later, Karam spun around and rear-ended the wall in turn 6, suffering major damage.
The yellow flag waved once again on lap 67 when Joe Graf Jr.’s right-front tire left a lot of debris on the backstretch, allowing for multiple restarts at the end of the race.
In the first overtime attempt, Allmendinger darted out to the lead over Gibbs. Then further back in the field, Herbst saw his day come to an end after he crashed hard into the wall near turns 4 and 5. This brought out another caution, and another restart.
But Allmendinger held off Gibbs and Noah Gragson for his fifth Xfinity victory of the year.
Allgaier, Josh Berry, Jones and Sam Mayer joined Austin Hill, Gibbs, Allmendinger and Gragson in the Round of 8.
Xfinity Results at the Charlotte ROVAL
Xfinity teams head to Las Vegas Motor Speedway next week. The race kicks off on Oct. 15 at 3 p.m. ET on NBC.
About the author
Joy joined Frontstretch in 2019 as a NASCAR DraftKings writer, expanding to news and iRacing coverage in 2020. She's currently an assistant editor and involved with photos, social media and news editing. A California native, Joy was raised watching motorsports and started watching NASCAR extensively in 2001. She earned her B.A. degree in Liberal Studies at California State University Bakersfield in 2010.
A daily email update (Monday through Friday) providing racing news, commentary, features, and information from Frontstretch.com
We hate spam. Your email address will not be sold or shared with anyone else.