Cole Custer captured his seventh win of the season in his 100th NASCAR Xfinity Series start when he took the checkered flag in Saturday’s Use Your Melon Drive Sober 200 at Dover International Speedway.
Custer tied Christopher Bell for the series high in wins and moves to the next round of the Xfinity Series Playoffs with the victory. He led 31 laps on his way to Victory Lane. He was one of three cars that had yet to pit when a caution came out on Lap 177.
“We didn’t have the track position all day,” Custer said after his win. “I’ve wanted to win here so bad for so long, just to win a gold monster is unbelievable…Everybody in the shop, (crew chief) Mike (Shiplett) made a great pit call, I can’t believe it turned out that way.”
Justin Allgaier, Austin Cindric, Justin Haley and Chase Briscoe rounded out the top five.
“We feel like at all three races in the round of 12 we were the best car and the worst finish was 3rd, so I am really proud of this MoneyLion Mustang team,” Cindric said. “I don’t think we had a car capable of winning today. In clean air we could hold our own but once we got behind we were probably a third place car and that is where we finished.
“I am proud of that effort and proud of the recovery. We will keep trying to bring this momentum to the next round.”
Briscoe won the pole, but had to start at the rear of the field for unapproved adjustments.
“It is encouraging how fast of a car we had but that is two weeks in a row I feel like we had the best race car and didn’t get the win,” said Briscoe, who led 71 laps. “There are so many circumstances that go into winning these races and one little thing that you don’t catch at the right time just kills you.”
Michael Annett, Noah Gragson, John Hunter Nemechek, Zane Smith and Ryan Sieg completed the first 10 finishers.
A quartet of drivers were eliminated from the Playoffs as Brandon Jones, Nemechek, Sieg and Haley failed to advance.
“I think we got the margin down to -6 or something like that,” Nemechek explained of his race to get above the cutline and into the next round of the playoffs. “We just haven’t been able to close this year. A valiant effort for our GMS Racing team. We’ll see what we have for the next few tracks”
The eight drivers that move on to the next round that begins at Kansas Speedway in two weeks are Bell, Briscoe, Cindric, Allgaier, Tyler Reddick, Gragson and Annett.
Allgaier won the first two stages of the race.
Bell had a bad day when he was forced to pit with a carburetor problem that dropped him multiple laps off the lead. He returned to the track to finish 25th.
“Yeah, that was disappointing,” Bell said. “I honestly have no idea what really happened. Going down the front straightaway it shut off. Then I coasted onto pit road. We changed carburetors and it seemed to run fine, but at that point, we were 10 laps down.”
The NASCAR Xfinity Series resumes on Saturday, October 18 at Kansas Speedway.
