Cole Custer held off a charging Justin Allgaier after a wild restart on Saturday (June 3) to score his first career road course win.
It’s Custer’s first win of 2023 and his first win since his return to the NASCAR Xfinity Series. Custer now has 11 career Xfinity wins too.
On the restart in NASCAR overtime, Allgaier and Creed were on the front row with Parker Kligerman in third. Kligerman made it three wide in turn 1 before making contact with both Creed and Allgaier. Custer was able to turn under the contact and grab the lead and the win.
Allgaier finished second, Sam Mayer third and Josh Berry and Austin Hill rounded out the top five.
Myatt Snider finished sixth with Creed seventh. Connor Mosack, Chandler Smith and John Hunter Nemechek, who battled back from a lap down, completed the top 10 in eighth through 10th, respectively.
“I’m just so happy, I’ve never won a road course race before. I’ve been so close, so many times.” said Custer after the race. “It’s just awesome. I’m pumped for the rest of the year. We got fast cars, starting to put it all together.”
Creed and Custer were supposed to start on the front row. However, Custer started from the rear of the field due to unapproved adjustments. Creed and Nemechek led the field to the green with Creed grabbing the advantage.
Chandler Smith spun in turn 1 of lap 1. Sammy Smith had to pit from a stuck shifter. Both Smiths also had penalties, Sammy Smith sped in the pits, and Chandler Smith violated the limits of the track in the chicane.
Stefan Parsons brought out the first caution on lap 18 after stopping on the track. Under the caution, Daniel Hemric’s car caught on fire as the field was about to take the green flag.
On the restart, Nemechek made the pass on Creed for the lead. However in turn 12 of the final lap of stage one, Nemechek slid wide, and Creed passed Nemechek back to win the stage..
After non-competitive pit stops, Creed and Nemechek led the field back to the green flag in stage two. Josh Berry spun in turn 1 to start the stage. Most of the top five stayed within three seconds of the lead throughout the second stage. Chandler Smith, Snider and Preston Pardus all spun out during the stage.
However, the race stayed green for all 25 laps. On the final lap, Nemechek made contact with Creed spinning him out in turn 12. This allowed Custer to make the pass and edge Nemechek to the line and win the second stage.
Custer led the field to the green of the final stage, but overshot turn 1 of the chicane and fell back to eighth. Allgaier took advantage and took the lead. With 20 laps to go, Creed retaliated with Nemechek spinning the No. 20 out. Nemechek fell to 17th. On lap 68, Riley Herbst lost an engine bringing out the caution.
Allgaier kept the lead on the restart with five laps to go. However, a debris caution pushed the race to NASCAR overtime. After a crazy restart in which the top three all made contact after Kligerman made a move into turn 1. Custer then grabbed both the lead and the win.
Xfinity Series Results from Portland
The Xfinity Series will be on track next Saturday (June 10) at Sonoma Raceway. You can watch the race on Fox Sports 1 at 8 p.m. ET.
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.
The most enjoyable part of this race was watching Creed dump the series dirtiest driver, JH Nemecheck.