The NASCAR Xfinity Series held the Super Start Batteries 188 At Daytona Presented by O’Reilly Saturday for some road course racing. It was an extremely exciting race, and one driver got his first win in his first-ever Xfinity Series start. That driver was 18-years-old Ty Gibbs in his No. 54 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota.
“You know, can’t thank everyone right now. This is like a dream come true for me.” Gibbs said, “I can’t do burnouts, that’s one thing I cannot do at all.” An emotional Gibbs added, “This is just a dream come true to me. I really didn’t think I had it there. Kind of fought back and won.”
Austin Cindric tangled with A.J. Allmendinger in the first stage and it looked like he wasn’t going to be a front runner. Cindric managed to fight back and bring his No. 22 Penske Racing Ford home in second place. He was hoping for a win for his team owner Roger Penske’s 84th birthday.
Cindric stated, “Obviously I don’t want to be racing to a stage that aggressively. I’d love to see the replay on that. Congrats to Ty.”
Coming in third was Daniel Hemric who was up in the mix of things the whole race, but couldn’t catch Gibbs and Cindric.
Stage 1:
Stage 1 only had one caution and that was for fluid on the track. The excitement was at the end when Allmendinger and Cindric got together coming to caution. Cindric held on to win the stage.
Stage 2:
Stage 2 started with Harrison Burton at the lead but six laps later Gibbs would take the top spot away. There were no cautions in this stage and Gibbs took the stage win easily.
Stage 3:
Stage 3 had Hemric, Gibbs and Cindric vying for the top spot. There were a couple of cautions that slowed the race some but nothing too serious. Restarts were the most interesting having cars spin off the track and back on. There were two NASCAR overtimes due to spinning cars. In the end, no one could touch Gibbs, giving him his first win in his first-ever Xfinity race. That is quite an accomplishment.
Brandon Jones and Jeb Burton would round out the top five. Harrison Burton, Miguel Paludo, Brandon Brown, Justin Haley, and Jeremy Clements finished sixth through 10, respectively.
Cindric leads the Xfinity Series standings with 105 points. Harrison Burton is in second with 81 points, Hemric is third with 75 points, fourth is Brandon Brown with 72 points and rounding out the top five is Myatt Snider with 69 points.
The NASCAR Xfinity Series will head next to Homestead Speedway on Feb. 27.
Official Results:
- Ty Gibbs
- Austin Cindric
- Daniel Hemric
- Brandon Jones
- Jeb Burton
- Harrison Burton
- Miguel Paludo
- Brandon Brown
- Justin Haley
- Jeremy Clements
- Brett Moffitt
- Landon Cassill
- Myatt Snider
- Jesse Little
- Michael Annett
- Kyle Weatherman
- Josh Williams
- Kris Wright
- Matt Mills
- Joe Graf Jr.
- Gray Gaulding
- Alex Labbe
- Colby Howard
- Tommy Joe Martins
- Cody Ware
- Justin Allgaier
- Ryan Sieg
- Noah Gragson
- Stephen Leicht
- Jeffrey Earnhardt
- Andy Lally
- Bayley Currey
- Preston Pardus.- Transmission
- Timmy Hill
- AJ Allmendinger
- Jade Buford – Suspension
- Ryan Vargas
- David Starr – Transmission
- Riley Herbst – Accident
- Natalie Decker – Accident
