A decent NASCAR Xfinity Series race at the Charlotte Motor Speedway ROVAL led into what looked like a fantastic finish until a fiasco right at its climax.
With 14 laps remaining, a caution came out that changed everything.
Thomas Annunziata hit the turn 1 wall after losing his brakes on the frontstretch, setting up a difficult situation for the leaders.
Most of the leaders elected to pit under the caution, with Shane van Gisbergen in second the only one not to.
On the ensuing restart, it became clear that taking tires was the right call, as the pitters ran through the field like an oatmeal bowl made with too much water.
Parker Kligerman, who spent much of the day hovering in the bottom half of the top 10, took the lead 10 laps to go. The retiring Kligerman then spent the next nine laps pulling out all of the stops to try and stay ahead of Sam Mayer.
The race to the finish felt like a microcosm of Kligerman’s career. The veteran Kligerman holding on and refusing to move over for the next generation in Mayer, who has opportunities that Kligerman never had in his career.
And then the caution came out, in a millisecond before Kligerman took the white flag – continuing the trend of the race being a metaphor for Kligerman’s career.
There will be more discussion on this situation down below, but regardless, on the ensuing restart, Mayer was able to get by Kligerman.
Kligerman struggled with a tire rub and fell to sixth on the finish. Mayer won and was able to clinch a spot in the next round of the playoffs. AJ Allmendinger finished second and advanced, while his teammate van Gisbergen finished third and came two points short of doing so.
The Winners
Mayer’s win was a bit flawed, but it definitely was not a fluke. Mayer was fast all day in spite of having to serve a penalty at the very start due to jumping the start of the race.
Mayer was able to drive back up through the field and may have even gotten by Kligerman regardless of that last caution had he not have a clutch issue that popped up late in the going.
Josh Bilicki‘s cameo appearance with Joe Gibbs Racing was a fair success. The Wisconsinite led 10 laps and definitely turned some heads. He ended up finishing in eighth, tied for the best finish of his career.
The Losers
It seems like just about everybody else lost with the finish we had, but one person who had a particularly rotten day was Sheldon Creed.
He got caught…
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