“It’s a group effort, a group effort!” AJ Allmendinger said as he cruised to yet another road course victory on Saturday (July 30) at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course.
Allmendinger and road course wins have become somewhat a given in the recent years of the NASCAR Xfinity Series, and the ‘Dinger added to that fame, leading 42 of the 62 laps of the Pennzoil 150. Noah Gragson and Josh Berry took home stages one and two, respectively, and Alex Bowman, Justin Allgaier, Ross Chastain and Chase Briscoe rounded out the top five as plenty of NASCAR Cup Series drivers looked to gain some much needed track time before today’s race.
While it was a dominating performance for Allmendinger, some others had a much more difficult day at the office, despite some high finishes.
The Winners
Usually I try to leave the race winner of this list for obvious reasons, but I just couldn’t after that performance. Not entirely because of what Allmendinger did, though, but what he opened the door for himself to do on Sunday.
Allmendinger won last year’s Cup Series race at the Brickyard, and now, with his third Xfinity win of the season (all of which have come on road courses, by the way) ‘Dinger has a shot at sweeping the entire weekend for Kaulig Racing. Last year’s win was the lone Cup Series victory for Kaulig last season, and if he can do it again, Allmendinger will be able to write himself even further into the history books of the young team.
Same time tomorrow, @IMS? 😏#TrophyHunting pic.twitter.com/ifDkVGutnn
— Kaulig Racing (@KauligRacing) July 31, 2022
With such a dominating performance, it’s tough to find someone else who truly won the day, but there’s always a silver lining somewhere, right? That silver lining was that although they may not have finished where they wanted, the JR Motorsports boys made their presence known. Gragson and Berry took home a pair of stage wins and all four drivers found their way inside the top 15.
The Losers
Ross Chastain, straight off the rip. If you’ve followed the Cup Series at all this season, you should know that Chastain’s antics have made him public enemy number one to plenty of folks in the garage. Several drivers have voiced their displeasure with the way he’s raced people this season, and for the most part I agree with them.
That, apparently, isn’t just contained to the Cup Series either. Sheldon Creed, a driver we’ve talked about plenty over the course of this season, was…
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