Corey Day takes the NASCAR O’Reilly Series jackpot in a back-and-forth battle with Kvapil in the Focused Health 302 at Las Vegas Speedway.
LAS VEGAS – In one of the most thrilling finishes of the season, 20-year-old Hendrick Motorsports rookie Cory Day won the final lap in a back-and-forth with 23-year-old JR Motorsports driver Carson Kvapil, who claimed: his third career win in the NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series Saturday at 302 Centered Health Las Vegas Motorway.
Corey Day. Jackpot Win:
Day and Kvapil traded the lead four times in the final 12 laps before Day made a bold pass after brushing the wall several times with two laps to go to clinch the cup lifter, which was ultimately decided by a scant 0.287 seconds.
“Oh man, I was just so tight in there and so scared, I was going to go down and plow the floor, let him get by me.” said a smiling Day, who started his No. 17 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet from the pole position, won the opening round and led a career-high 136 of 201 laps.
“Just a great car. We struggled over the summer to be honest. We won Talladega (in April) and then Dover came pretty close and then it just dried up. This feels really good. Definitely a dominant day for us, great car.
“I knew from the start of the year we were going to be a title contender,” added Day, whose win moves him to fifth in the 12-driver championship standings with five races remaining in the season.
“It’s just been a dry summer there, but we’re moving things in the right direction. We’ll just keep working.”
Disappointment for Carson Kvapil
Kvapil, who like Day also scored his first career streak of the season (at Indianapolis and Iowa), was understandably disappointed to lose Saturday’s win, but also excited by the showing. That moved him into second place in the championship standings, now 19 points behind Haas Factory Team’s Sheldon Creed in 13th.
“I feel like our stuff was really good down there,” Kvapil said. “I had a really good car today. Kudos to the guys who made us the first three cars. In the end I thought the 17th (day) was pretty tight. The lapped traffic kept him there and I was able to find some speed at the bottom of turns one and two. Just never really tried the fence. I knew when I ran in front of him, and ran the best corner.
Reigning series champion Richard Childress Racing’s Jesse Love finished in third place behind the duel, followed by JGR teammates William Savalic, one of four Chase ineligible drivers in the top ten, and Taylor Gray.
Haas Factory Team’s Sam Mayer, another Chase-eligible driver, finished sixth in an impressive comeback. He won stage 2 and led 40 laps (from day two) but had to regroup at the back of the field after a pit stop penalty during the stage 2 break.
Non-Chase drivers Jeremy Clements, William Savalic and Anthony Alfredo finished seventh, eighth and tenth, respectively, while Chase driver Austin Hill finished ninth.
Justin Allgeier and Brandon Jones
It was a particularly impactful race for former series champion and season’s most accomplished team, JR Motorsports’ Justin Allgaier. He collected in an accident on lap 55 with fellow Chase competitor Joe Gibbs Racing’s Brandon Jones.
Just after winning the race on the restart from a first-lap break, Jones’ No. 20 Toyota developed a problem and spun into Allgaier’s No. 7 Chevrolet in the second turn, sending it into the wall. Both vehicles were towed back to the garage. Allgeier was able to get back on the track with 84 laps to go and made one lap to move up in the standings at the end of the race.
“I checked and tried to sneak past him (Jones) on the outside, but it just didn’t work out,” Allgeier said. “I hate it for everyone in the seven teams. Obviously we’ve had a lot of speed everywhere we’ve gone all year, but to start the Chase like this was pretty disappointing. But we’ll go next week and try to win another race. A disappointing end to a day where I thought we were making some progress.”
It was only the second DNF of the season for six-race winner Allgaier, who held a commanding 229-point lead in the regular-season standings before the points reinstatement for the Chase run. However, his 34th-place finish dropped the regular-season champion from second to fourth in the standings, 31 points behind leader Creed.
Sheldon Creed continues to lead the series points by 19 points over Carson Kvapil. Jesse Love (-21) ranks third, while Justin Allgeier (-30) and Corey Day (-41) round out the top five.
Next
The NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series returns next Saturday at Charlotte Motor Speedway. The Blue Cross NC 250 begins at 4 PM ET on The CW, PRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio. This is the first fall race at the 1.5-mile Charlotte oval since 2017, when Alex Bowman lifted the trophy for Chip Ganassi Racing.