Noah Gragson wraps up Xfinity regular season with third straight

A.J. Allmendinger might have won his second straight NASCAR Xfinity Series regular season championship at Bristol Motor Speedway, but Noah Gragson got to puke for the third race in a row (which isn’t a good thing, even if it came in response to a good thing).

Much like how Ty Majeski won the Truck Series race the previous day, Gragson did not lead any laps until the final restart with twenty laps remaining set up by a caution involving his team-mate and a slower car (in Gragson’s case, JR Motorsports ally Justin Allgaier made contact with J.J. Yeley which shot the latter into the wall). Gragson would hold off Brandon Jones to win his third straight race; he is the first driver to achieve the feat since Austin Cindric swept the Kentucky doubleheader and won Texas in 2020, but the first to do so in three separate weeks and locations since Christopher Bell at Kentucky, Loudon, and Iowa in 2018.

“That last caution came out, and I knew if I could ring the top, it was going to be hard for them to get there,” commented Gragson. “I appreciate Brandon Jones racing us clean. He gave us the bumper with two (laps) to go, and I was hanging on, scrubbing the fence.”

Prior to the caution, Allgaier dominated the affair by winning Stage #2 and leading 148 laps. However, while he avoided damage in the Yeley incident, he was caught speeding on pit road which dealt the death blow to his chances.

Gragson did not have a totally clean journey to Victory Lane either. On lap 150, a battle for the lead led to Gragson clipping Stage #1 winner Ty Gibbs which sent him into Sheldon Creed, who needed to win to qualify for the playoffs and whom Gragson defeated at Darlington two weeks prior.

“If it was God’s plan for us to win tonight, we would’ve,” said Gibbs. “I feel like the guys made a really good progress over the last year from this car, from what we had last year. I felt like we were a little off last race here last September. We came back and I feel like we were one of the fastest, so very thankful for that.”

Race results

Finish	Start	Number	Driver	Team	Manufacturer	Laps	Status
1	9	9	Noah Gragson	JR Motorsports	Chevrolet	300	Running
2	11	19	Brandon Jones	Joe Gibbs Racing	Toyota	300	Running
3	15	21	Austin Hill	Richard Childress Racing	Chevrolet	300	Running
4	5	1	Sam Mayer	JR Motorsports	Chevrolet	300	Running
5	12	98	Riley Herbst	Stewart-Haas Racing	Ford	300	Running
6	4	16	A.J. Allmendinger	Kaulig Racing	Chevrolet	300	Running
7	2	8	Josh Berry	JR Motorsports	Chevrolet	300	Running
8	14	45	Stefan Parsons*	Alpha Prime Racing	Chevrolet	300	Running
9	3	7	Justin Allgaier	JR Motorsports	Chevrolet	300	Running
10	10	39	Ryan Sieg	RSS Racing	Ford	300	Running
11	20	4	Bayley Currey	JD Motorsports	Chevrolet	300	Running
12	21	26	Jeffrey Earnhardt	Sam Hunt Racing	Toyota	300	Running
13	18	23	Anthony Alfredo	Our Motorsports	Chevrolet	300	Running
14	6	18	Sammy Smith^	Joe Gibbs Racing	Toyota	299	Running
15	7	27	Jeb Burton	Our Motorsports	Chevrolet	299	Running
16	19	51	Jeremy Clements	Jeremy Clements Racing	Chevrolet	299	Running
17	33	34	Kyle Weatherman	Jesse Iwuji Motorsports	Chevrolet	299	Running
18	31	02	Sage Karam	Our Motorsports	Chevrolet	299	Running
19	28	44	Ryan Ellis	Alpha Prime Racing	Chevrolet	299	Running
20	8	11	Daniel Hemric	Kaulig Racing	Chevrolet	298	Running
21	30	92	Josh Williams	DGM Racing	Chevrolet	298	Running
22	36	31	Myatt Snider	Jordan Anderson Racing	Chevrolet	298	Running
23	37	07	Joe Graf Jr.	SS-Green Light Racing	Ford	298	Running
24	35	38	C.J. McLaughlin	RSS Racing	Ford	297	Running
25	34	68	Kris Wright*	Brandonbilt Motorsports	Chevrolet	297	Running
26	25	36	Alex Labbé	DGM Racing	Chevrolet	297	Running
27	23	35	Patrick Emerling	Emerling-Gase Motorsports	Chevrolet	294	Running
28	32	77	Ronnie Bassett Jr.	Bassett Racing	Chevrolet	294	Running
29	24	48	Nicholas Sanchez	Big Machine Racing Team	Chevrolet	294	Running
30	27	08	David Starr	SS-Green Light Racing	Ford	293	Running
31	38	6	Bobby McCarty	JD Motorsports	Chevrolet	288	Running
32	17	91	Mason Massey	DGM Racing	Chevrolet	271	Oil Line
33	26	66	J.J. Yeley	MBM Motorsports	Toyota	267	Accident
34	29	78	B.J. McLeod	B.J. McLeod Motorsports	Chevrolet	220	Brakes
35	16	10	Landon Cassill	Kaulig Racing	Chevrolet	188	Running
36	1	54	Ty Gibbs	Joe Gibbs Racing	Toyota	129	Accident
37	22	2	Sheldon Creed	Richard Childress Racing	Chevrolet	128	Accident
38	13	5	Brandon Brown	B.J. McLeod Motorsports	Chevrolet	45	Accident
DNQ		52	Brennan Poole*	Jimmy Means Racing	Chevrolet
DNQ		13	Chad Finchum	MBM Motorsports	Toyota
DNQ		47	Dawson Cram	Mike Harmon Racing	Chevrolet

Bold – Currently in playoffs
^ – Currently in owner playoffs
Underline – Eliminated from playoffs
Italics – Competing for Rookie of the Year
* – Ineligible for points