Oct. 3, 2027, will go down as quite the eventful day for Sheldon Creed.
The NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series points leader entering the weekend started it by announcing his move to an entirely new-to-him team, Sam Hunt Racing in 2027. Then he rolled off second with current organization Haas Racing Team, finished 13th and somehow still extended his lead at the top of the Chase standings by eight points.
Creed took the green flag in his No. 00 from the front row and led seven laps in the early going before slipping back through the field during stage one.
“I would take off really good every run on tires and then, yeah, I would just fall off really bad,” Creed told Frontstretch postrace. “But I feel like we kind of slowed the falloff down a little bit by the end and was able to climb back from … I think we were running 15th or 16th at one point.”
What really saved Creed’s night was a nightmare race for JR Motorsports veteran and championship competitor Justin Allgaier, who finished 34th and picked up just four points after being caught in a wreck not of his own making with Brandon Jones, who had a loose front tire following a pit stop.
Even so, Creed was well aware it represented something of a missed opportunity.
“Yeah, brutal for what could have been a great points night for us, and maybe we could have walked out of here with a 30- or 40-point lead, but we’ll take 19 and move on,” he said. “Weird because we came into the day with a lot of momentum, and the day looked promising, but yeah, I just have to move on, take it on the chin and go on to Charlotte [Motor Speedway].”
Creed also failed to score a single stage point. Although he won the previous week at Bristol Motor Speedway, he has collected just five stage points during The Chase.
“Obviously tonight was tough, and we’ve struggled to get good stage points really through the Chase,” Creed said. “So yeah, just going to need to clean it up a little bit and be a little stronger really to try to finish this thing out.”
While Creed’s immediate focus is on the next five races and trying to win the title, his day had begun in the media center, announcing a multiyear deal to move to SHR in 2027.
Creed spoke more about the impending move postrace.
“Bummed to leave these guys [Haas], because we get along great and everyone at the shop’s amazing and we really do have a great relationship,” he said. “But excited to go to Sam [Hunt]’s and kind of have something to help build and have some fun with.
“Obviously my end goal is, you know, to run [the NASCAR] Cup [Series] one day, but the big team, they want more and more money every year. And Sam’s just somewhere where, if I never get that opportunity, that I can go run for Sam for the next 15 years and make decent money and try to build it into a winning race team, and have a lot of fun doing it.”
Danny Peters has written for Frontstretch since 2006. An English transplant living in San Francisco, by way of New York City, he’s had an award-winning marketing career with some of the biggest companies sponsoring sports. Working with racers all over the country, his freelance writing has even reached outside the world of racing to include movie screenplays.
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