Riley Herbst Wins Xfinity Series Thriller at Indianapolis

By David Morgan, Associate Editor

SPEEDWAY, Ind. – Ladies and gentlemen, the NASCAR Xfinity Series.

The fans in attendance for Saturday’s Pennzoil 250 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway certainly got their money’s worth in the return to the famous 2.5-mile oval for the first time in three years.

What looked to be Cole Custer’s race down the stretch turned into a three-car battle royale, with Custer’s Stewart-Haas Racing teammate Riley Herbst and Aric Almirola joining the fray as the laps wound down.

As the laps clicked away toward the finish, Herbst chewed away at Custer’s lead, which stood as high as 1.4 seconds at one point and with two laps to go, he was right on his teammates rear bumper, ready to strike.

With a bump to Custer to move him up the track off Turn 4 heading to the white flag, Herbst looked to be in the catbird seat to surpass Custer and take over the outright lead, but lurking behind them was Almirola, who was able to pull three-wide with the two Fords and swing around the outside to take the lead for himself heading into Turn 1 for the final time.

However, Herbst wasn’t going to give up the fight, running right in Almirola’s tire tracks through Turns 1 and 2 and down the backstretch, just waiting to make his move.

Much like the move he pulled on Custer to get the lead a lap earlier, Herbst charged down into Turn 3 and got under Almirola enough to get him to wash up the track, allowing him to pull alongside him in the short chute and clear him off Turn 4.

From there it was all defense for Herbst, as he was able to keep Almirola and Custer in his rear-view all the way to the finish line to bank his first win of the season and secure his spot in the Playoffs.

“This is Indianapolis. This is the most famous racetrack in the world and it is an honor just to walk in this place, let alone win,” said Herbst. “We had speed all year and I felt like we could win but I just messed up on the restarts a little bit. It was a good fight. I thought I had Cole clear and then he slid bottom of three with the 20 and I thought it was going to be tough. I just continued to work.

“It has been a pretty tough week on me mentally to be honest with you. I am proud of these guys and everybody at Stewart-Haas Racing. Obviously the news of us shutting down, these guys could have given up on me, gone to different teams, but they stuck behind me.

“That is back-to-back wins for Stewart-Haas Racing. Thank you so much Monster Energy. Thank you to everybody in Las Vegas, my family. I am going to go drink beer and turn my phone off for three weeks.”

Custer was able to get around Almirola at the line to finish second, giving Stewart-Haas a 1-2 finish on the day, with Almirola crossing the line in third.

“I mean, you could see us beating doors down the front stretch. You are going to do everything it takes to win Indy,” Custer said. “I was doing everything I could to get this thing to turn. I needed one less lap. I felt like it was kind of a disadvantage to lead all day. If you were in second you would get your car looser which would save your tires throughout a run. Whereas if you were leading you would just get so tight after 15 laps.

“What an awesome day for SHR. Two cars at the front all day. We qualified 1-2 and finished 1-2, an unbelievable day for SHR. I hope we keep this rolling.”

Almirola’s day appeared to be done after a spin on Lap 68, but somehow he was able to keep his car off the wall and luckily no other cars collided with him in the process.

When the final caution flag flew with 15 laps to go, Almirola was able to cycle back into the top-five, putting him in position to strike late.

“I thought that was our only chance if we were going to steal one,” said Almirola. “The Stewart-Haas (Racing) cars were the class of the field all weekend. I thought that was my chance to try, when they (Riley Herbst and Cole Custer) got side-by-side and make something happen.

“I thought it was going to work out. I thought I was going to get clean air and was going to be okay, but Riley’s car was so good, and he got to my left rear and got me tight. It happened earlier in that run. I’d get so tight when he’d get to my left rear.

“Hats off to those guys, they did a great job. Proud of everyone at Joe Gibbs Racing. Tyler (Allen, crew chief) and the all the guys on this 20 team. They just did as great job. Proud of the effort and dang, that hurts.”

Shane van Gisbergen claimed his second top-five oval finish of his Xfinity Series career with a fourth-place result, while Sheldon Creed rounded out the top-five.

“Just special, like an awesome day,” van Gisbergen said afterwards, unable to wipe the smile off his face.

“I feel like I have been getting better every week with the ovals and improving and I’m just patient. I guess I just build up, get better and better and in the race I got more confident and yeah, I got some laps there in clean air actually with Conor [Daly] and we kind of learned together it felt like. Then when I got in traffic around good cars, I was confident to run with him.”

The remainder of the top-10 finishers went to Austin Hill, Daniel Dye, AJ Allmendinger, Justin Allgaier, and Carson Kvapil.

Conor Daly, the Indy 500 veteran making his Xfinity Series oval debut came home in 14^th place after getting collected in a crash on the opening lap.

“Dude, I was literally in between the wall and two vehicles and thought, this NASCAR thing was fun while it lasted, but the wheels were still somewhat straight,” Daly said. “The car was really fast. I honestly had a tremendous time.

“I think I got moved out of the way a little bit which I expected, but for the most part, I really enjoyed the racing. Racing with Shane (van Gisbergen) was really fun. He’s awesome to race with – the other guys in this series too. It was really fun to race up front with these guys. I watch every week and I enjoy watching the series. This Toyota was fast. It has a lot of character to it now.”

The Xfinity Series will be off for the next three weeks during the Olympic break before returning on August 17 at Michigan International Speedway.

Pennzoil 250 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway Results