By Josh Farmer, IndyCar Reporter & NASCAR Contributor
After running inside the top five for much of the day, Justin Allgaier was forced to settle for a ninth place finish in Saturday’s Boyd Gaming 300 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
Allgaier qualified his No. 7 Tax Slayer Chevrolet in sixth place and immediately moved into the top five when the green flag dropped. He remained among the front runners over the course of the opening 72 lap green flag stretch with the JR Motorsports pit crew performing flawless pitstops to keep him in the top five. Allgaier brought the No. 7 in for a pitstop under the yellow for four tires, fuel and some adjustments to fix a loose handling condition and picked up two spots in the process to line up third on the restart.
Following the restart, the handling didn’t improve for Allgaier as he slid back to fifth place when it was time for the next pitstop of the day. He returned to the track and was running in fourth place when the red flag flew on lap 136 when Cody Ware got loose in turn 2 and collected Darrell Wallace Jr. and Justin Marks.
A stop under the yellow to top off the No.7 with Sunoco race fuel set the stage for the final run to the checkered as Allgaier lined up in fourth place for the following restart. It would soon fall out as Daniel Suarez, who restarted in second place, spun his tires directly in front of Allgaier. He then became a helpless bystander as he was passed by Brandon Jones and Brennan Poole and soon fell into the clutches of Ty and Austin Dillon.
He then would remain in ninth place for the remainder of the race as Kyle Busch would go on to lead 199 of 200 laps to score his 78th career Xfinity Series win and his 1st at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
Image: NASCAR Media Group
