Austin Hill won Saturday’s (Sept. 7) Focused Health 250 for his third win of the 2024 NASCAR Xfinity season after leading the final 12 laps of the race and holding off two last-lap charges from Chandler Smith and Corey Heim to collect his fourth win at Atlanta Motor Speedway.
Hill nabbed his ninth-career Xfinity Series win, seven of which have come on the drafting-style tracks of Atlanta and Daytona International Speedway. Hill is now tied with Dale Earnhardt Jr. for third most drafting track wins in Xfinity Series history.
“Our Bennett Chevrolet wasn’t handling great all day,” Hill said. “It had plenty of speed. The handle on it was tough all day. We had to dig deep for that one. The 81 (Chandler Smith) got into (turn) 3 and had me jacked up. He’s doing what he had to do to win. (I’m) very surprised that the 26 pushed me there and didn’t go with a Toyota.”
Parker Kligerman finished runner-up for the third time in his Xfinity Series career, falling short to Hill by a margin of .34 seconds.
AJ Allmendinger charged through the field in the final laps to finish third after leading the most laps (40), while Smith was the highest-finishing Toyota, finishing fourth in his Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota. Smith ran second approaching the final lap with a Toyota of Heim behind him in the Sam Hunt Racing No. 26. Instead of pushing Smith, who had a fast run on the bottom, Heim chose to push Hill instead.
Smith was upset at Heim’s decision post-race.
“We’re Toyota teammates.” Smith said. “I got clear out of the restart zone and could of went bottom and hung him out to be the leader (of) the top lane, and I didn’t. I stayed up top with my Toyota teammate, ultimately gave up the lead doing that. I expected my Toyota teammate to come with me, and that didn’t happen… I’m kind of speechless honestly … I was trying to be a good teammate, and it didn’t pay off for me today as usual.”
Heim got the run on Hill and took it to the high side in turn 1, racing side-by-side with the No. 21 before brushing the wall in turns 1 and 2 and fading back to fifth.
“I though that I messed up into (turn) 1 and 2, and I hate it that (Heim) got into the fence,” Hill said. “I wasn’t trying to run him into the fence. I was trying to get him aero tight or get him aero loose because that was happening to me a lot today. If anyone ran up the track from the bottom, I would have big moments.”
Jesse Love, Sammy Smith, Josh Williams, Brandon Jones and Ryan Truex rounded out the top 10.
Sam Mayer went for a fiery ride on lap 78 after his spotter cleared him too early in front of Taylor Gray on the frontstretch, which sent his No. 1 Chevy into the wall entering turn 1.
The damage ignited a flame in the back of the car when Mayer reached turn one, which ended stage two early.
Justin Allgaier had one of the fastest cars of the day as he had one of the only cars that was able to make unassisted passes on the bottom line of the racetrack. Allgaier led 19 laps on the day.
While battling for second with Cole Custer, Allgaier came together with Custer and blew a right front tire going into turn 3, collecting Custer, Taylor Gray, Riley Herbst, Ryan Sieg and pole-sitter Jesse Love in a multi-car pileup. The wreck brought out a 15-minute, 42-second red flag.
Sieg was on a recovery drive after his No. 39 RSS Racing Ford lost power early in the race after his coil wire came off. He went down two laps after the power failure and made his way back into the top five before being involved in the pileup.
Sieg came into Atlanta 10 points behind Sammy Smith for the final playoff spot. He’s now 44 points behind with two races remaining before the playoff grid is set.
Xfinity Atlanta 2 Results
The Xfinity Series returns with two races left for the Mission 200 at the Glen at Watkins Glen International with coverage for the final time of the season by USA Network.
Wyatt Watson has followed motorsports closely since 2007. He joined FrontstretchĀ as a journalist in February 2023 after serving in the United States Navy for five years as an Electronic Technician Navigation working on submarines. Wyatt is one ofĀ Frontstretch's primary IndyCar correspondents, providing exclusive video content on site. He hosts Frontstretch's Through the GearsĀ podcast and occasionally The Pit Straight.You can find Wyatt's written work inĀ columns such as Friday Faceoff and 2-Headed Monsteras well as exclusive IndyCar features. Wyatt also contributes to Frontstretch'sĀ social media team, posting unique and engaging content for Frontstretch.
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