Ryan Truex used the draft perfectly at Daytona International Speedway Friday night. After getting out in front of the field, he got the jump when the race went to Overtime and was in position when the caution flew after the field took the white flag to secure his third career Xfinity Series win and second of the season.
With ten laps to go, AJ Allmendinger, who led the most laps, was working to block both lanes of the track when he dove down to the bottom to get in front of a run. Truex, who’d been running up front and putting himself in position, seized on the opportunity to get to the outside and take the lead.
Truex, a part-time driver in the Xfinity Series driving the No. 20 for Joe Gibbs Racing, then went head-to-head with series veteran Allmendinger for the rest of the closing laps until a big wreck in Turn 3 on lap 95 of 100 sent the race into Overtime. Truex took the jump on the restart and cleared Allmendinger before he saw the white flag, with the final caution coming out just after.
Truex said that he was fortunate to see the caution flag as he expected a big run to come from behind and wasn’t sure he’d be able to block it.
“I didn’t really have one to be honest,” Truex said when asked what his plan was for the Overtime restart. “I couldn’t figure out if I wanted the top or the bottom. I restarted on both lanes and felt like neither of them were great, but I fell back in 2018 – I had the lead, and I took the top and I lost the race and I didn’t want to do that again, so I figured I would try the opposite of that and go to the bottom.”
He gave credit to Riley Herbst pushing him from behind and spotter Tyler Green giving him eyes in the sky for the strong restart.
“Riley gave me a crazy push, so shout out to him. He didn’t wreck me – just straight up pushed me. Once the restart shook out, I was just listening to Tyler telling me where to block. AJ – I knew he had a run coming to the white. I knew he was going to go for it going into [Turn] One and I got lucky, and all of those guys hit each other, and the caution came out. Here we are.”
For Truex, the win is a sign that he deserves more opportunities inside a racecar rather than just serving as a part-time or test driver.
“It shows I’m versatile,” Truex said. We’ve won at Dover and Daytona – can’t be more opposite. This is my eighth race of the year – period. I don’t race late models or trucks or ARCA or any of that stuff. I do my sim work at TRD during the week, and that is my main focus and on weekends that I get to race, I put all of my effort into this car. To be able to add to the list of winners they’ve had in this car is really special.”
The soft-spoken Truex acknowledged that while he may not look particularly excited – echoing his brother’s mannerisms in that respect – the win meant a lot to him.
“It’s Daytona, it’s The World Center of Racing. I’m sure it’ll soak in. It’s really cool.”
The final caution that ultimately ended the race frustrated Parker Kligerman. Running third, he was trying to get around Allmendinger to move up and contend for the lead. But, when Kligerman dove to the left to take a run, Allmendinger went with him, causing the bumpers to touch and sending Allmendinger sideways onto the apron and veering back into traffic.
Kligerman slowed as a result before the caution came out, giving Chandler Smith the chance to get around to secure the runner up position while Kligerman had to settle for third.
A very annoyed Allmendinger parked his car in the middle of pit road, got out, and left it there. He led a race high 35 laps after taking control in the third stage.
Riley Herbst and Ryan Sieg rounded out the top five as the highest-finishing Ford drivers. The two had very different outlooks on the race.
Herbst, who already has a win on the season and is looking for another, was disappointed with his finish after running in the front of the pack all night.
“We just weren’t good enough,” said an unhappy Herbst. “We gave the 20 a pretty good shot. I feel like that’s what won him the race, so congrats to everybody over there. They were really fast today, but I don’t know. I thought we worked really hard and we had a fast Monster Energy car for sure, but we just weren’t as good as we needed to be for sure. We were just a little too bogged down and too bound up, but we’ll go back to work.”
Sieg, who is fighting on the cutline for a points spot in the Playoffs with four races to go, was very happy with the finish and the points haul.
“It’s exactly what we needed to come out of Daytona and to come out of Daytona in one piece is always good, and then a top five,” he said. “At the beginning of that race I thought something was wrong with the car. The handling was off and it was all over the place and then to recover and I just got over and drove the heck out of it and came home fifth.”
Jordan Anderson finished sixth. Justin Allgaier, who ultimately came home seventh, swept the stages to pick up two extra Playoff points, leading 16 laps on the night. Sheldon Creed, Leland Honeyman, and Kyle Weatherman rounded out the top ten.
The race featured seven caution flags for 34 laps, including one twelve-minute red flag for the wreck that brought out Overtime.
Austin Hill, who’s especially strong on the superspeedways, sweeping the first two at Daytona and Atlanta, was taken out of contention early.
After the second round of qualifying was canceled due to lightning, the field was set by times in the first round. That gave pole to Chandler Smith and the outside pole to Austin Hill. However, Hill failed to get rolling off pit road at the start and then was sent to the rear for an unapproved adjustment because of a change to the steering pump.
That penalty proved fateful: when Jeremy Clements got loose in Turn 3 after a bump from Jeffrey Earnhardt, Hill was collected along with Gus Dean, Ryan Ellis, and Akinori Ogata. The latter is a Japanese part-time driver making his first start at Daytona. Hill ended up taking the car to the garage on lap 13 after meeting minimum speed.
Hill ultimately finished 31st after making repairs and getting back onto the track.
Stage 2 finished under caution as Jesse Love shoved Anthony Alfredo up the track, putting Alfredo into the wall and causing Sam Mayer to spin onto the apron trying to avoid.
The big one occurred on lap 76 when Jeb Burton tried to move around Sammy Smith. With Chandler Smith jockeying him to his inside, Sammy Smith Smith moved up, sending Burton around. The wreck ultimately collected Jesse Love, Brandon Jones, Josh Williams, Parker Retzlaff, Matt DiBenedetto, and Cole Custer.
The red flag came out for the big wreck in Turn 3 on lap 95 with five laps to go. The 26 of Jeffrey Earnhardt, trying to get around Anthony Alfredo as he fell back in the pack after getting very loose, turned across the nose of the 45 of Caesar Bacarelli, sending both of them into the wall and collecting Shane van Gisbergen, Josh Bilicki, Patrick Emerling, and Jeremy Clements. That brought the race into Overtime.
