Anthony Alfredo has plenty of reasons to smile in 2024. (Photo: Jennie Mae Lingle | The Podium Finish)
Anthony Alfredo is one of the feel good stories after the first 11 races of the NASCAR XFINITY Series season. The 25-year-old driver from Ridgefield, Connecticut, and his No. 5 Our Motorsports Chevrolet Camaro team are punching above their weight against a competitive field.
With a top five finish at Talladega alongisde five top 10s, Alfredo ranks 10th ahead of the BetMGM 300 at Charlotte Motor Speedway. Beyond the box score, the driver known as “Fast Pasta” delivered with a memorable moment in the BetRivers 200 at Dover Motor Speedway.
“We have five top tens in just the first ten races, three of which which have been in a row,” Alfredo said. “We qualified for the XFINITY Dash 4 Cash by finishing top three at Talladega and actually pulled off what seemed like the impossible at Dover by actually winning the Dash 4 Cash and being the highest finishing of the four eligible drivers.
“And the reason I say seemingly impossible is because we are racing an RCR (Richard Childress Racing) car, a Stewart-Haas car and a team with a Stewart-Haas alliance, whereas we have no alliance, no technical support, very few crew members and very little equipment. Not to mention a budget that’s a fraction of the size of the larger team.”
Maximizing resources, even when they are not by the plentiful in Alfredo’s case, has been the theme of his career. Through it all, he has risen above those challenges with determination and humility.
“To go out there and be as competitive as we have been and beat those organizations is a huge accomplishment, especially with the Dash 4 Cash, that can really do a lot for our team and we can put that to good use,” he shared. “So just really thankful for the opportunity. I’m blessed to be doing what I love for a living and at such a high level of competition
“I’m nowhere near where I want to be at. But we have some amazing partners supporting us. Everybody’s been working really hard and I know all the fans have been psyched to see us running well and contending for finishes up front each week.”
Alfredo has not lucked into his top 10 results this year. Rather, he has earned these strong finishes by pure merit and his experience as a savvy, methodical racer.
After competing in 13 races during the 2019 NASCAR CRAFTSMAN Truck Series season, the sim to reality driver impressed in his part-time schedule with Childress’ NASCAR XFINITY Series ride in 2020.
Particularly, Alfredo’s third place finish at Texas Motor Speedway offered a refreshing reaction with his emotional, tearful post-race interview. It was a prelude of the promising potential within the passionate driver.
Following a tough rookie season in the NASCAR Cup Series in 2021, Alfredo returned to Xfinity competition in 2022. This time, he paired up with Our Motorsports’s No. 23 entry.
Overall, it was a respectful campaign with a top five and four top 10 results, placing him 14th in the championship standings.
Last year, Alfredo moved to BJ McLeod Motorsports’s No. 78 operations. A couple of top 10 results with the independent team led to a 20th place finish in the standings.
Returning to Our Motorsports’ renumbered No. 5 entry this year, Alfredo celebrates his journey with the intangibles he has brought to the table.
The unmistakable colors of Anthony Alfredo’s No. 5 Chevrolet have become a constant presence toward the front of the field like at Dover, Delware. (Photo: Daniel Rankin | The Podium Finish)
“It’s really rewarding. And it’s come with a lot of experiences that I’ve had throughout my career, on and off the track,” he remarked. “Things haven’t always been easy — really at all.
“I’ve learned a lot of things the hard way through mistakes. And it’s made me a lot better person, a much better race car driver. And I feel like I’ve helped a lot of smaller teams accomplish a lot with a little by helping build the programs up and become more competitive with the experience I have now.”
All those experiences have molded Alfredo as the poised, ambitious and humble racer embraced by his peers at the track and the fans in the grandstands. Most of all, Alfredo’s progress has come within the past decade.
“A lot of it was just trial and error,” Alfredo said. “Some of it was trial by fire, just from inexperience and being a rookie and getting started with my racing career so late at the age of 15, compared to drivers that have been doing it for much longer than that.
“And I’m finally finding my footing and coming into my own just now. I’m only 25 years old. So I feel like the future is bright and there’s a lot ahead of me.”
Potential takes time and perseverance. Much like Caitlin Clark, the star WNBA rookie, or Tom Brady, a seven-time Super Bowl winning quarterback, it is about having some grace and trust in the process.
“You just have to see things through sometimes,” he said. “And this year, I’ve really seen things come full circle just for me personally on the competitive side and even just away from the racetrack.
“So it’s been really rewarding. That being said, I got to take advantage of these opportunities and really put my foot down and go to work to keep it rolling. And we’re top 10 in points, which is unreal. That is so awesome.”
In the midst of a career season, Alfredo believes in his No. 5 team and the resources at his Our Motorsports campus with reaching postseason glory.
“If we can point our way into the Playoffs, that’s going to be a huge story, even more so than all the the wins we’ve had along the way this season,” Alfredo offered. “So I’m looking forward to that challenge. We got to just keep up the great work and putting ourselves in position late in the race like we have been then executing, and that’s really what it’s come down to for us this season.
“So we’ll just keep the momentum rolling and if we can pull that off and make the Playoffs, with or without a win. I know that first round is really intriguing. If we can crack that top 12 and be there, there’s actually a good chance we could make the next round just because of the tracks in that first round. So I’m not trying to get ahead of myself, but a lot of promising things on the horizon.”
Undoubtedly, Alfredo recognizes the successes in his career and with his hardy team is the result of the individuals at the track and shop. Surrounded by those with a like mindset, Alfredo and his crew consistently motivate each other to achieve their utmost potential.
“It just comes down to people [like] Josh Graham, my crew chief,” he stated. “He’s got something to prove, just like I do. And he works really hard. He’s a good leader for our team. Keith Barnwell came in as the general manager and he’s spotting for me. That’s been awesome. Everybody on the crew’s been doing their part.
“Chris Our and his family have provided me an awesome opportunity. And we’ve got great sponsors in our portfolio that’s constantly growing. So there’s just a lot of things to be excited about, and we’re excited to just keep plugging away one race at a time.”
Along the way, Alfredo has found a trusted resource that has proven to be more than a tool for optimizing his physical wellbeing. In this case, it is an immersive, innovative wearable technology that points out his strengths and areas of opportunities.
Anthony Alfredo was on the hammer when he needed to be in his No. 62 Dude Wipes Chevrolet during the GEICO 500 at Talladega. (Photo: Ricky Martinez | The Podium Finish)
“Pison Technology, a company that I discovered late last year and started working with just for cognitive performance, I can track my mental focus, my mental agility, and even just my reaction time on the spot, my mental readiness, which is critical before getting in and out of the car,” Alfredo explained. “Whether it’s for qualifying, the race, and just seeing how caffeine or adrenaline or training all those things affect my body and my neurophysiology, it actually picks up on that, those senses in your body, which is really cool.
“I’ve been able to test regularly throughout the day and see, maybe at 3:00 in the afternoon, I’m actually faster than 6:00 in the morning when I wake up. Or maybe late at night, I start slowing down and some days are hit or miss. There’s different environmental factors. It could be what you ate, what you drank, just if you slept well or not. But you can see all that with Pison technology and using their app and just keeping track of.”
Given the intensity that stock car racing inherently places on a driver like Alfredo, he recognizes how Pison’s wearable neural interface can be a game changer like SMT data offers to finding the right lines at the track.
“It’s cool because on the dashboard, on their website, I could even just kind of really dive deep into my results over the last few days, weeks and months and see trends, which is really awesome,” he said. “So now that I’ve been wearing the device for a while, I’ve been able to improve my reaction time, my focus, my agility.
“Those are the three main things that Pison Technology focuses on. But there’s even a safety aspect to it, for me as a driver, just making sure that I’m not just physically, but mentally prepared to get behind the wheel and make split second decisions at 200 miles an hour.”
Pison Technology’s sensor, worn on the wrist, has come into play for the young racer, most recently during the frantic, spring Talladega Superspeedway race weekend.
“It certainly helped me just be on my toes and be ready for anything,” Alfredo recalled. “In that case, on the last lap, even in the XFINITY race, we had a green-white-checkered finish where I drove from 18th to third. And in the Cup Series race, I drove from 18th to sixth, and that one just came down to avoiding a big last lap melee and accident on the front straightaway.
“It was just instinct. It wasn’t even me having to think about it. I just instinctually turned hard left into the infield. The grass was the only place I could go to try to not pile into a wreck. And I was able to still gather the car up through the wet grass at Talladega Superspeedway at 200 miles an hour, get back on the racetrack and cross the line in sixth for my new career best Cup Series finish.”
Aside from the successes at “The World’s Fastest Superspeedway,” Alfredo recalled a time where Pison Technology’s wearable neural biosensor fueled him to qualify on time with Beard Motorsports’ No. 62 ride in the 66th annual DAYTONA 500.
“Just a couple of races I was doing with Beard Motorsports, starting with the DAYTONA 500, where my mental readiness helped me qualify into that race on time and not have to worry about racing in the Duels,” he said. “So that was really cool to see those kind of go hand in hand and be relative to the device.
“The mental training I’ve been doing with Pison Technology and in the XFINITY race, just executing well in that restart, it’s pretty awesome. I’m excited to see where it goes. I know they have a lot of exciting plans and some more technology coming out here soon.”
Not surprisingly, given Alfredo’s successes with the wearable biosensor, his over-the-wall crew at Our Motorsports have started to reap the benefits with their pit stops.
Anthony Alfredo and his No. 5 team have maximized results with the help of Pison Technologies. (Photo: Josh Jones | The Podium Finish)
“I’m sure more and more drivers are going to be looking into it,” he said “I’d love to see more people use it. For me, as a competitive advantage, I feel like I have right now, but like I said, there’s just kind of a safety aspect and it’s important to all of us are doing our part.
“Cognitively, mentally, not just physically, but we also hooked our pit crew up with some Pison Technology devices because their reaction time and their readiness, their agility, their focus is critical, as important as mine. And we all know races can be won or lost on pit road. So we’re all doing our part to be as prepared as possible. And it’s cool to see it improving our performance.”
Along with maximizing mental and physical acuity, Alfredo looks forward to racing in this competitive series in the short and long haul. Pursuing a Playoff spot and win in 2024, Alfredo recognizes how the NASCAR XFINITY Series is thriving ahead of a dedicated TV partner starting next year.
“It’s really exciting. The XFINITY Series has been so competitive,” Alfredo said. “I think the cars are a blast to drive. Great to race. We put on an awesome product for the fans and to know that it’s going to be available for everyone at home, it’s not limited access.
“Everyone has the channel. They can look at the CW Network and see the NASCAR XFINITY Series races and on track coverage. So that’s huge for not just our series, but the sport of NASCAR in general. And I’m definitely pumped to see where it goes.”
