BROOKLYN, Mich. – An incredible week for A.J. Allmendinger got even better Saturday afternoon at Michigan Int’l Speedway.
Fresh off an upset victory in the NASCAR Cup Series on the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course, Allmendinger came out on top of three overtime restarts to win the NASCAR Xfinity Series New Holland 250.
“What a hell of a six days,” Allmendinger exclaimed upon exiting his No. 16 Kaulig Racing Chevrolet on the frontstretch at the two-mile oval. “Oh my goodness.”
RESULTS: NASCAR Xfinity Series New Holland 250
Were it not for a caution with less than 10 laps left, the battle for the win likely was going to come down to JR Motorsports teammates Justin Allgaier and Josh Berry.
Berry, who was racing the No. 1 Chevrolet in place of Michael Annett while Annett recovered from surgery, appeared to have the best car in the final stages of the race. He initially took the lead with a phenomenal three-wide move coming out of turn two on lap 88, overtaking Allgaier and Allmendinger as the battled through traffic.
The final round of green flag stops followed less than 20 laps later and while Berry opted for four tires and fuel, Allgaier’s team went with fuel only to catapult him into the lead. Berry quickly ran him back down and was about to take the lead when the caution waved for the stalled car of Jeb Burton, who had run out of fuel just before pit road.
Allgaier dove for pit road prior to the restart for fresh tires, giving the lead back to Berry when the race resumed with five laps left. Berry initially got a solid restart and held off Allmendinger, who restarted to his inside, but Allmendinger stormed back coming out of turn two on the next lap.
Roaring to the inside of Berry, Allmendinger was able to take the lead as they raced down the backstretch as Berry faded to third. The caution waved moments later for a multi-car incident down the backstretch, setting up an overtime restart.
Allmendinger stuck to the top for the restart with Berry the first to take the bottom via the choose rule. Allmendinger held serve on the top and pulled into the lead out of turn two, but just as they were exiting turn four to take the white flag the caution waved again for a stalled car in turn two.
The second overtime attempt saw Allmendinger again retain the lead, but coming out of turn two and down the backstretch Ty Gibbs got loose and slammed the outside wall to bring out another caution flag.
The third overtime restart attempt proved to be the charm for Allmendinger, who got a big push from Brandon Jones going into turn one to again retain the lead. Jones ran second and tried to run Allmendinger down, but he couldn’t get close enough to stop Allmendginer from registering his third Xfinity Series victory of the season.
“When you’re restarting on the front row, the outside was the place to be,” Allmendinger explained. “The problem is you’ve got to hope you got pushed. Brandon Jones, thank you so much because he pushed me every time.
“I don’t want to wake up from this dream,” Allmendinger added.
Noah Gragson finished third, with Berry ending up fourth after leading late in the race. Harrison Burton completed the top-five.
Several contenders were eliminated from the race at the start of the second stage in a multi-car accident, including championship leader Austin Cindric, Daniel Hemric and Myatt Snider.