By Luis Torres, Staff Writer
Another night of tempers flaring at Martinsville Speedway featuring one driver’s bid of advancing into the Championship 4 evaporate.
Last night, it was a verbal confrontation between Taylor Gray and race winner Christian Eckes. Fast forward to Saturday night, it was a verbal confrontation with an attempted punch from Chandler Smith to Cole Custer after the National Debt Relief 250 concluded.
Without a NASCAR ride in 2025, Chandler’s mission was simple — win and advance for a shot at an Xfinity Series championship at Phoenix Raceway next Saturday.
However, the reigning champion got in the way of accomplishing the daunting objective in the eyes of the soon-to-be departing Joe Gibbs Racing competitor.
There was no love loss between Chandler and Custer as both fought hard for a win at Kansas, only for neither visiting victory lane as Aric Almirola ultimately won the race.
In the eyes of Custer over a month ago, he didn’t appreciate having to lift off the throttle exiting Turn 3 as Chandler cut the racing line off.
Such action wasn’t forgotten by neither men as evident when it came to crunch time. With 31 laps remaining, both racers were chasing down Almirola for the win. A win by Chandler meant Custer would be the first man out of the Championship 4.
As they entered Turn 1, Chandler bumped Custer out of the way and took second.
Seconds later, the caution came out when Chandler’s teammate Sheldon Creed sent Brandon Jones into the wall, bunching up the field for a critical restart. Almirola chose the inside lane while both Chandler and Custer picked the top which led to a breaking point for both racers.
A textbook move of “race others how they race you” was applied by Custer, who gave a bump right back at Chandler entering the first corner.
“What comes around, goes around,” said Custer after the move over the radio.
The move relegated Chandler from second to fifth that left him irritated and made his intentions known that such move could cost him a shot of retaining the Xfinity title. Especially when Sammy Smith, who’s only option to move on is by winning, was now ahead of Custer and in position of knocking him out of the Championship 4 with a win.
“What he’s going to do is get his fucking ass beat up after the race if he keeps fucking around. Little punk ass bitch,” Chandler on Custer’s move.
Sammy fought hard to chase down Almirola, as did…
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