Sam Mayer, Sheldon Creed escape Charlotte with Round of 8 berths

Sheldon Creed could only watch as Daniel Hemric threw his car to the inside of Parker Kligerman and Kaz Grala as they came to the finish, but he let out the biggest sigh of relief when it turned out Hemric was unable to pass either of them.

Creed and Hemric were separated by just two points as Saturday’s NASCAR Xfinity Series race at the Charlotte Motor Speedway Roval came to an end, with whoever having the edge getting to advance to the Round of 8 of the playoffs. While Creed was running tenth, Hemric was seventh and needed to pass just more cars as a tie between the two would be broken in Hemric’s favour as he had the best finish of the round. Kligerman was also below the cut line but would have needed every leader in front of him to retire, leaving him in a scramble for pride with Hemric and Grala.

Grala barely beat Kligerman for fifth, who in turn edged out Hemric by a hood’s length. Creed settled for tenth to take the eighth and final spot in the next round.

“I wasn’t nervous at the end, but it definitely wasn’t fun or comfortable,” said Creed. “Luckily, I had the #10 (Hemric) and #48 (Kligerman) only two cars ahead of me on track, so I could watch and judge off their moves to see if I needed to throw a Hail Mary on the final lap. Our #2 team sort of stumbled our way through the first round of the playoffs to advance to the Round of 8 though, so we are fortunate that we had the luck that we did. We still have work to do to bring faster race cars to the track. It was a battle out there, especially for a road course.”

Creed was not the only driver needing a near-miracle to qualify for the next round. Sam Mayer was even further back at thirty-four points below the cut line entering Charlotte, but put himself in prime position early by winning the pole and leading all but seventeen laps.

Cole Custer, who locked himself into the Round of 8 on points, challenged Mayer for the win in the closing ten laps. They comprised the front row for the last restart with five laps remaining, and Mayer overtook him on the inside a lap later. Custer was unable to catch up. The win is Mayer’s third of 2023, all of which have come on road courses after Road America and Watkins Glen.

The final green flag occurred after Justin Allgaier and Jeb Burton, the latter at the bottom of the Round of 12 prior to Charlotte, wrecked going into turn one. Allgaier was already safe thanks to his playoff-opening win at Bristol.

Race results

Finish	Start	Number	Driver	Team	Manufacturer	Laps	Status
1	1	1	Sam Mayer	JR Motorsports	Chevrolet	67	Running
2	7	00	Cole Custer	Stewart-Haas Racing	Ford	67	Running
3	3	8	Josh Berry	JR Motorsports	Chevrolet	67	Running
4	9	98	Riley Herbst	Stewart-Haas Racing	Ford	67	Running
5	14	26	Kaz Grala	Sam Hunt Racing	Toyota	67	Running
6	6	48	Parker Kligerman	Big Machine Racing Team	Chevrolet	67	Running
7	4	10	Daniel Hemric	Kaulig Racing	Chevrolet	67	Running
8	38	20	John Hunter Nemechek	Joe Gibbs Racing	Toyota	67	Running
9	8	21	Austin Hill	Richard Childress Racing	Chevrolet	67	Running
10	5	2	Sheldon Creed	Richard Childress Racing	Chevrolet	67	Running
11	22	18	Sammy Smith	Joe Gibbs Racing	Toyota	67	Running
12	17	16	Chandler Smith	Kaulig Racing	Chevrolet	67	Running
13	25	39	Ryan Sieg	RSS Racing	Ford	67	Running
14	31	19	Myatt Snider^	Joe Gibbs Racing	Toyota	67	Running
15	10	91	Alex Labbé	DGM Racing	Chevrolet	67	Running
16	12	11	Jordan Taylor	Kaulig Racing	Chevrolet	67	Running
17	32	6	Brennan Poole	JD Motorsports	Chevrolet	67	Running
18	29	08	Stefan Parsons	SS-Green Light Racing	Chevrolet	67	Running
19	28	44	Rajah Caruth*	Alpha Prime Racing	Chevrolet	67	Running
20	33	92	Josh Williams	DGM Racing	Chevrolet	67	Running
21	26	45	Leland Honeyman	Alpha Prime Racing	Chevrolet	67	Running
22	23	31	Parker Retzlaff	Jordan Anderson Racing	Chevrolet	67	Running
23	15	51	Jeremy Clements	Jeremy Clements Racing	Chevrolet	67	Running
24	16	24	Connor Mosack	Sam Hunt Racing	Toyota	67	Running
25	18	07	Josh Bilicki	SS-Green Light Racing	Ford	67	Running
26	13	4	Kyle Weatherman	JD Motorsports	Chevrolet	67	Running
27	20	66	Sage Karam	MBM Motorsports	Ford	67	Running
28	24	02	Blaine Perkins	Our Motorsports	Chevrolet	67	Running
29	11	9	Brandon Jones	JR Motorsports	Chevrolet	67	Running
30	21	78	Anthony Alfredo	B.J. McLeod Motorsports	Chevrolet	67	Running
31	35	38	Joe Graf Jr.	RSS Racing	Ford	67	Running
32	36	28	Kyle Sieg	RSS Racing	Ford	67	Running
33	37	35	Alex Guenette	Emerling-Gase Motorsports	Toyota	67	Running
34	19	27	Jeb Burton	Jordan Anderson Racing	Chevrolet	66	Running
35	34	53	Conor Daly*	Emerling-Gase Motorsports	Chevrolet	66	Running
36	30	43	Ryan Ellis	Alpha Prime Racing	Chevrolet	63	Accident
37	2	7	Justin Allgaier	JR Motorsports	Chevrolet	60	Accident
38	27	25	Brett Moffitt	AM Racing	Ford	40	Ignition
DNQ		87	Andy Lally	Peterson Racing Group	Chevrolet
DNQ		50	Preston Pardus	Pardus Racing	Chevrolet
DNQ		17	Boris Said	Hendrick Motorsports	Chevrolet
DNQ		74	Devin Jones	CHK Racing	Chevrolet

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