After a wild last couple of laps of the inaugural Coronado Naval Base street course race, Richard Childress Racing’s Austin Hill was able to grab his second win of the 2026 NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series season.
Hill passed Taylor Gray on the final lap to win the United Rentals Driven to Serve 250 on Saturday night (June 20) as he chased Gray down in the closing laps.
“Where there was blood in the water behind the No. 54, I knew it was going to be tough to get around him,” Hill told The CW broadcast in victory lane. “When I got clear of him (Taylor Gray), I was very surprised to see how much of a gap I got on him.”
This battle took place after Gray and Carson Kvapil made contact battling for the lead, leading to Kvapil spinning out and once again coming up short of his first win in the series.
“I just got really bad wheel hop at the end of my run,” Gray told The CW on pit road. “He (Carson Kvapil) was racing me tight like he should and I wheel hopped underneath him.”
“That one really hurts but I felt like he (Taylor Gray) was a little better than us right at the end there,” Kvapil told The CW broadcast on pit road. “When you’re racing for the win like that, you got to put everything out on the race track. I’m sure that’s what he was doing, and I was too.”
Sheldon Creed finished third, Kvapil had to settle for fourth and Sammy Smith rounded out the top five.
Jesse Love, Parker Retzlaff, Austin Green, Harrison Burton and Corey Day finished in the sixth to 10th positions.
This also marked RCR’s first win since the tragic and sudden passing of Kyle Busch last month, and it ended up being the driver taking over Busch’s seat in the Cup Series who was able to bring the organization back to victory lane.
After a long Truck Series race on Friday night, the O’Reilly race followed that up with a race that took around four and a half hours to finish after two red flag delays.
The first red flag of the event occurred right at the start after Day hit a manhole cover on the first lap, leaking fluid all over the course.
Day’s grill was punctured but since the track had a problem, NASCAR allowed the No. 17 team to replace the radiator and make up the laps they lost before the race restarted. Day’s team was allowed to work under the red flag and managed to have a solid day.
The second red flag came in an early part of the final stage of the race on a restart. Sam Mayer clipped the inside wall going into the first turn, bouncing into traffic and hitting the outside wall so hard that it broke, leading to another stoppage.
Along with Mayer, Anthony Alfredo, William Sawalich, Brent Crews and several others were involved in the one major incident of the race.
Justin Allgaier remains the points leader by 224 points over Jesse Love in second place. Sawalich holds the final Chase spot by five points over his Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Crews and six points over Rajah Caruth.
NASCAR O’Reilly San Diego Results
The NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series will return to action for the 19th race of the season on Saturday, June 27, at Sonoma Raceway at 5:30 p.m. ET. Coverage of this race will be broadcast on The CW.
Michael Bellifemini joined Frontstretch in February 2026 as a contributor. Bellifemini was born and raised in New Jersey and graduated from Seton Hall University. He called Seton Hall men's and women's basketball games for their college radio station, 89.5 FM WSOU, and continues to broadcast in the area. Outside of covering NASCAR, Bellifemini is also an avid baseball, football, basketball, and hockey fan and enjoys watching different sports leagues on a daily basis.
Thanks for choosing to comment on this article. A name and email address are required to post a comment. The email address is not publicly visible or shared. Please keep in mind that comments are moderated according to our comment policy.