Allgaier Steals Victory, Takes Champ 4 Spot in Martinsville Thriller

MARTINSVILLE, VIRGINIA – OCTOBER 28: Justin Allgaier, driver of the #7 Hellmann’s Chevrolet, celebrates in victory lane after winning the NASCAR Xfinity Series Dead On Tools 250 at Martinsville Speedway on October 28, 2023 in Martinsville, Virginia. (Photo by Chris Graythen/Getty Images)

RIDGEWAY, Va. — For most of the afternoon, Justin Allgaier remained below the NASCAR Xfinity Series playoff cut line.

But somehow, in the final two laps, the seas parted and he took advantage. By a mere 0.032-second margin, Allgaier won a drag race with Sheldon Creed to the checkered flag to win Saturday’s Dead On Tools 250 at Martinsville Speedway.

The victory solidifies Allgaier’s fourth Championship 4 appearance in the last five seasons for the JR Motorsports No. 7 team.

“I can’t even begin to describe tonight. The effort on the radio — those guys trying to keep me in the game,” Allgaier said in his post-race press conference. “Jim [Pohlman, crew chief] caught a Hail Mary on a pit strategy. He said ‘look, bro, I know this isn’t what you want to do,’ but he said this is what we had to do.”

That strategy involved a pit stop on Lap 156, a calculated risk to hopefully result in track position for crunch time. The team had to think out of the box to beat Sammy Smith, the dominant car.

After starting on the pole, Smith surrendered his track position 44 laps into Stage 1 to set himself up for later in the race. He led a race-high 147 laps but fell two spots short of a win to secure a Championship 4 bid.

“I think we did everything right,” Smith said after the race. “It’s just kind of typical for this race for what it brings and we just have to move on to next week.”

As the laps ticked down, the race went haywire. While 15 cautions for 101 laps interrupted the event, a crash with seven laps to go triggered by Layne Riggs and Myatt Snider claimed 12 cars and resulted in a 28-minute red flag.

Going into NASCAR Overtime, Austin Hill and Sheldon Creed held the top spots with Allgaier in fifth. The Richard Childress Racing teammates roughed each other up — eventually leading to Hill crashing out of Turn 4 on the final lap. Allgaier had enough space through the corner to get even with Creed and beat him to the line for the victory.

“That’s twice now this year I’ve second-guessed whether we came across the line as the winner or not,” Allgaier said, also referring to his win at Daytona in August. “They said don’t move — not an ideal situation, I’m gonna be honest with you. But when they finally gave me the all clear and Dave Burns [NBC reporter] gave me the thumbs up and said we’d actually won, what an incredible emotion that went through.

“Tonight, honestly, was really odd. I mean, the seas just parted and it worked out. But when I walked out of here tonight, whether we made it or we didn’t, I knew that I gave 100% and I was comfortable with who I was as a person and how I race when I walked out of here, and it’s all I can ask for.”

(Photo: Phil Cavali | The Podium Finish)

After earning eight stage points, John Hunter Nemechek secured a berth in the Championship 4 following Stage 2, joining Sam Mayer after his win at Homestead-Miami Speedway. That allowed Nemechek to solely focus on racing for the win, but he got caught up in the last-lap melee.

“We were going to try to lock in early, and then go for the win, and that’s what we tried to do – just came up short,” Nemechek said. “Everyone is going to go for broke – win to get in, whatever it takes. It definitely sucks to not have a good finish coming out of here, but on the bright side we are racing for a championship next week in Phoenix.”

Cole Custer secured the final Championship 4 spot despite finishing 19th and also suffering damage during the final-lap chaos.

“If we can get through today, we can do about anything,” Custer said when viewing his championship prospects. “I’m looking forward to it. We got the pole there at Phoenix earlier in the year, we just have to tune on it and get it a little bit better, but I think we should have a good shot at it.”

Hill, Creed, Chandler Smith and Sammy Smith were all eliminated.

(Note: A full analysis of NASCAR Overtime is available here.)

Stage 1 Top 10 Results

1. Justin Allgaier
2. Cole Custer
3. John Hunter Nemechek
4. Austin Hill
5. Sammy Smith
6. Anthony Alfredo
7. Riley Herbst
8. Myatt Snider
9. Chandler Smith
10. Josh Bilicki

Stage 2 Top 10 Results

1. Sammy Smith
2. Josh Berry
3. Myatt Snider
4. Sheldon Creed
5. Kaz Grala
6. Parker Retzlaff
7. Chandler Smith
8. Cole Custer
9. Brandon Jones
10. Riley Herbst

Dead On Tools 250 Results

Points Following Round of