COLE CUSTER | RILEY HERBST
Daytona NASCAR Xfinity Series Advance
NASCAR Xfinity Series Overview
- Event: Daytona 250 (Round 22 of 33)
- Date: Friday, August 23
- Location: Daytona (Fla.) International Speedway
- Layout: 2.5-mile oval
- Time/TV/Radio: 7:30 p.m. EDT on USA/MRN/SiriusXM NASCAR Radio
Cole Custer Notes of Interest
- Cole Custer and the No. 00 Fanttik team are looking to rebound in Friday night’s Daytona 250 at Daytona (Fla.) International Speedway. The 2023 NASCAR Xfinity Series Champion ran into some bad luck last Saturday at Michigan International Speedway in Brooklyn after his No. 00 Ford Mustang Dark Horse sustained damage in accident on lap 48 of the scheduled 125-lap race. While the team was able to repair most of the damage, a series of cut right-front tires kept forcing Custer to pit road, prompting crew chief Jonathan Toney to bring the car to the garage just 17 laps shy of the finish. It was just the second DNF (Did Not Finish) for Custer in 2024, a season that has featured a July 13 victory at Pocono (Pa.) Raceway, a runner-up finish to teammate Riley Herbst at Indianapolis Motor Speedway the following weekend, along with three pole positions, 16 top-10s and 427 laps led. With five races left in the regular season, Custer remains the leader in the NASCAR Xfinity Series driver standings by a 12-point margin over second-place Justin Allgaier. In addition to race wins, Custer’s primary goal is to claim the regular-season title, which he has yet to do in his career, and take home another 15 playoff points to provide him a cushion when the Round of 12 kicks off on Sept. 28 at Kansas Speedway in Kansas City.
- Friday night’s Daytona 250 on Daytona’s historic 2.5-mile oval will mark Custer’s 165th career Xfinity Series start and his 10th at the track. He scored career-best finishes in both races there last season – ninth in February and fifth in August. Prior to last year, Custer never finished better than 14th at Daytona. In his most recent visit to the track in February, he earned a 13th-place finish after being shuffled back in the closing laps. In addition to his Xfinity Series starts at Daytona, Custer has five NASCAR Cup Series starts, one NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series start, and one ARCA Menards Series start. Best of those was his 10th-place finish in the February 2016 ARCA race.
- Fanttik is a youthful, dynamic brand dedicated to outdoor, household, sports and automotive products that cater to every need for the perfect adventure. In a short span of time, Fanttik has garnered extreme acclaim from enthusiasts, social media influencers, digital media and consumers. It has earned the internationally revered Red Dot Design Award multiple times, along with the prestigious IF Design Award. Fostering the motto, “We explore, we innovate and we make it happen,” Fanttik has brought trailblazing experiences in the automotive arena to the most diverse audience. For more information, visit Fanttik.com and, on social media at Facebook, X, Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn, Reddit and Quora.
Riley Herbst Notes of Interest
- Riley Herbst, the driver of the No. 98 Monster Energy Ford Mustang Dark Horse for Stewart-Haas Racing, is ready to put the bad luck of last Saturday’s race at Michigan International Speedway in Brooklyn behind him as he heads to Friday’s Daytona 250 at Daytona (Fla.) International Speedway. After starting second for the scheduled 125-lap race at Michigan, Herbst led four laps and looked to be on his way to compete for the win when a misjudged gap while passing the No. 39 Ford Mustang of Ryan Sieg sent him into the outside SAFTER Barrier and ended his day on lap 48. He was able to earn four bonus points with his seventh-place Stage 1 finish. Herbst has clinched a berth in the NASCAR Xfinity Series Playoffs thanks to his July 20 win at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. He currently sits sixth in the regular-season standings, 23 points behind fifth-place AJ Allmendinger. He’ll be looking for his third career Xfinity Series win and his second of the 2024 season at Daytona – a track that has been good to him in the past.
- Friday’s race marks Herbst’s 11th career Xfinity Series start on the 2.5-mile oval in Daytona. His best finish at the track is fourth, earned in August 2020 and February 2022. When the series visited the track for February’s season opener, Herbst qualified 11th and finished sixth. In his four seasons with SHR, Herbst has finished outside the top-15 just twice at Daytona.
- Herbst has eight starts at Daytona outside of the Xfinity Series – three in the ARCA Menards Series, two in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series, and three in the NASCAR Cup Series. He earned a best finish of seventh in the Truck Series season opener in February 2020. He made his Cup Series debut in the February 2023 Daytona 500, during which Herbst earned an impressive 10th-place finish to become only the second driver in NASCAR history to record a top-10 in his Cup Series debut in the iconic race. He joined Terry Ryan, who made his debut in the 1976 edition of The Great American Race and finished sixth. Herbst went on to participate in both Cup Series races at Talladega (Ala.) Superspeedway last year and the August Daytona race, earning a best finish of ninth in the October Talladega race after leading 10 laps, his first laps led in the Cup Series. He returned for this year’s 66th running of the Daytona 500, where he had a strong week leading up to the feature race in the No. 15 Monster Energy Zero Sugar Ford Mustang Dark Horse for Rick Ware Racing. Herbst started sixth in Thursday night’s Bluegreen Vacation Duel No. 2 and led seven laps to follow up his strong 2023 starts. But a subsequent accident forced him to the rear of the Daytona 500 starting grid. He finished the race 24th.
Cole Custer, Driver of the No. 00 Fanttik Ford Mustang Dark Horse
Superspeedways, especially Daytona, are unpredictable by nature. How do you prepare for a race where it’s difficult to make a solid plan because anything could happen?
“So that’s what is so tough about Daytona and superspeedways. Your plan is always changing. There can be like 15 situations that could happen, and no matter what situation, you have to know what to do when presented with each one. Honestly, you have to take these races lap-by-lap to see what kind of scenario you’re in and then adapt from there. You can’t have a solid plan going into a superspeedway because it’s always going to change and you’re forced to adapt to whatever comes your way.”
We’re heading back to where the season started at Daytona. Talk about how you feel your season has gone so far as there are only 12 races left.
“I think overall our season has gone well. We obviously didn’t show the speed we did last year at the beginning part of 2023, but as we got to the summer months, I feel like the No. 00 team really hit our stride. We were one of the cars to beat all summer. There’s been bad luck, especially last weekend at Michigan, but one bad race doesn’t make or break your season at this point. We have a win and that gets us into the playoffs. We have the opportunity to experiment because of that win so that once we get to the playoffs, we can hopefully figure out how to win all the way to the championship. This season has been great, and we’ve welcomed some new partners like Fanttik. Hopefully we can give them a good run this weekend at Daytona.”
Riley Herbst, Driver of the No. 98 Monster Energy Ford Mustang Dark Horse
Daytona has been one of your better tracks on the circuit, even though superspeedways seem to be a place where luck plays a huge part. Would you say you’ve just found a good string of luck or is there something that you find you excel at in superspeedway racing?
“Honestly, it’s a little bit of both. You have drivers who are just strong superspeedway racers, so I do think it’s a skill to know how to run there. You know how to stay out of trouble but also have speed. At these races, it’s all about being there at the end. Sure, you want to get stage points and run well, but if you’re super aggressive too early, you can put yourself out of the race. So you have to be smart, but there is that element of luck. Sometimes there are situations out of your control and that’s just superspeedway racing. We’ve been on both ends – having a great day and being caught up in an accident not of our own doing. I think this No. 98 Monster Energy team will have a shot at the end of this race if we can just stay out of trouble. I’m excited to get back down to Daytona with them.”
You’ve been in contention to win a couple of superspeedway races in your career. What would it mean to get a third career win Friday night under the lights at an iconic track like Daytona?
“Winning at Daytona would mean a lot. It’s one of those iconic racetracks like Indianapolis that everyone around the world knows. Daytona is anyone’s to win, but it’s still special. You’re a winner at Daytona and it puts you in a different history book. I’ve gotten wins at two very different tracks. We have one win on the season, so we know we can take chances now and Daytona is one of those that we can just go for the win and not have to worry about points. That hasn’t been the case in the past few seasons. I know the No. 98 team will give me a fast car, so I think we’ll be in contention this weekend if we just stay out of trouble.”
