Lady luck dealt a winning hand to Justin Allgaier for the second consecutive week as he came out on top in an Overtime finish at Homestead-Miami Speedway. Kyle Larson, who dominated the race, suffered a disappointing loss after contact from Sam Mayer.
Kyle Larson put on a driving clinic in Saturday's NASCAR Xfinity Series Hard Rock Bet 300 at Homestead-Miami Speedway, but the 2021 NASCAR Cup Series champion was not rewarded with a win for his heroic efforts throughout the race.
Larson, who led 132 laps on the day, held a more than 16-second lead over Sam Mayer and had lapped nearly the entire field as the race was drawing to a close. Sheldon Creed, in fifth, was the final car on the lead lap when all of a sudden, a caution for a spinning Taylor Gray wiped out Larson's seemingly insurmountable lead with eight laps to go. On the impending Overtime restart, Larson was shoved from behind coming to the green flag by Mayer, who chose to line up behind Larson in the bottom lane on the final restart of the race. The shove lifted the rear tires of Larson's car off the ground, which allowed Austin Hill and Justin Allgaier to skirt past to the lead of the field. After a couple-lap battle, Allgaier would come out on top for his second-consecutive NASCAR Xfinity Series win, which would also secure the JR Motorsports driver a $100,000 bonus for winning the Xfinity Dash4Cash Award. After climbing from his No. 17 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet, Larson, who looked to be heading to a certain date with destiny on Sunday, where he'dLarson won Friday night's NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race Larson's felt the disappointment at Homestead before, as this is the third time he's led more than 100 laps in a NASCAR Xfinity Series race at Homestead, and in those three dominant races, he only has one win to show for it. But Saturday's loss stung particularly for Larson because of how he felt he was raced by Mayer, who drives for Haas Factory Team, on the restart of the race. "I don't know. I've lived through it a number of times here, but, obviously a bummer again to have another Homestead race play out that way. Just I can't go when my rear tires are off of the ground," Larson said in his post-race interview. "I know it looks like I choked another one away, but I did everything I thought I could. just lagged back and slammed the shit out of me, and my rear wheels came off the ground. So, bummer, but cool to have as big of a lead as we had, but would have loved to get a win for everybody on this 17 car. They don't get to race all the time." While Larson was left fuming following the final restart of the race, Mayer, who climbed to a second-place finish, says he simply made a mistake trying to anticipate when Larson was going to choose to launch from the restart zone. "Yeah, I mean, I just mistimed it, unfortunately. And got to his bumper a little too early," Mayer admitted. "He went really, really late in the box just playing games. Like, that's what you've got to do at this level to get the advantage, but he just waited really long, and I wasn't kind of ready for him to wait that long. I was giddy to get going." While the story of the day was the late-race beef between Larson and Mayer, Allgaier was left to celebrate his 27th career victory in the NASCAR Xfinity Series in victory lane. Allgaier admits before fate dealt him the perfect hand on the final restart, he had come to terms with the fact that he wasn't meant to win Saturday's race. “Today was one of those days where it wasn’t our day, we got behind and we were able to persevere to get this Trademark Nitrogen / BRANDT Fresh Agriculture Chevrolet in Victory Lane, it’s special,” Allgaier said. “ yesterday, if there was anywhere I could win it would be here because I just feel like this place has gotten me so many times.” The win, which is Allgaier's first ever at Homestead-Miami Speedway, ends a longstanding tradition of Allgaier coming up short at the 1.5-mile speedway. By taking yet another win, and scoring the Xfinity Fastest Lap on the final lap of the event, Allgaier extended his NASCAR Xfinity Series point lead to 29 points over Mayer, who moved up one position to the runner-up spot in the regular season championship standings.Jesse Love dropped one spot to third in the championship standings, and he now sits 31 points out of the championship lead with a sixth-place finish on Saturday at Homestead. By being the top-four highest finishing NASCAR Xfinity Series regulars, Allgaier, Mayer, Austin Hill, and Sheldon Creed have qualified to battle for the next Xfinity Dash4Cash $100,000 bonus in the series' next event. Next up for the NASCAR Xfinity Series is the Marine Corps 250 at Martinsville Speedway, which is scheduled for Saturday, March 29. That event will be televised on The CW with coverage slated to kick off at 5:00 PM ET.Toby Christie is the Editor-in-Chief of Racing America. He has 15 years of experience as a motorsports journalist and has been with Racing America since 2023.
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