NASCAR
Sam Mayer Earns Second Career Win in Watkins Glen Overtime
WATKINS GLEN, N.Y. – After Ty Gibbs dominated the day, the No. 19’s race unfolded thanks to a few late restarts. In overtime, Sam Mayer was third behind Gibbs and made contact, sending the 19 around in turn one. The two young drivers with a colored history added another moment to this storyline at Watkins Glen, with neither driver appearing apologetic for using each other up.
From the pole Ty Gibbs looked unstoppable early. The winner at Indianapolis last week swept both Stages by wide margins, appearing to be the unmatched class of the field. The 19 continued to gap the competition with seemingly no end of this domination in sight. Even with a fuel mileage race developing at the finish, Gibbs was on and off pit road with nine laps left. Prior to a late caution, the 19 had raced his way back up to third.
On the restart with three laps left, Gibbs lined up third but found the lead by turn four. Gibbs grabbed the lead after using up his old rival Sam Mayer though, with carnage soon unfolding behind them. Exiting the bust stop, Justin Allgaier was turned off the nose of Cole Custer, collecting many cars behind them. The race would be sent into overtime, with Sam Mayer none too happy about how the restart played out.
On the overtime restart, Gibbs got a jump on Austin Hill, but Mayer was out of control behind him. The 1 wheel-hopped aggressively into turn one, nailing the 19 of Gibbs and sending him around. The spinning Gibbs also took out Hill, briefly giving the lead to Sheldon Creed.
By the white flag though, Mayer’s beaten and battered Chevrolet muscled by the 2 for the lead. After aggressively saving fuel since lap 48 and with heavy damage, Mayer picked up career win number two from Watkins Glen.
“On that first (restart) I got used up,” Mayer said. “Thought I had a good one there. All glory to God for this one, we had to work our tails off for it. Mardy (Lindley, crew chief) on top of the box and everyone on pit road earned this one for sure. Feels good to have a car as fast as Xfinity 10G no matter where you go and no matter what the situation is. To do it in front of all these northeastern fans feels really really good.”
“I wheel-hopped it,” Mayer said about the final restart. “That’s unfortunate and I feel bad for doing that obviously. Don’t want to take out a Gibbs car or any car like that. Just trying to get another Xfinity Series win, I got a lot of catching up to do. I was in there, my nose was there, and that’s part of it. Fenders are fenders. That’s an accident but I think everyone can agree that it’d ok for an Xfinity Series regular to win this race.”
Behind Mayer and Creed, the top-10 finishers were: Parker Kligerman, Ross Chastain, Connor Mosack, John Hunter Nemechek, Cole Custer, Chandler Smith, Alex Bowman and Jeb Burton.
Austin Hill and Ty Gibbs went from the front row on the overtime restart to finishing 14th and 17th respectively.
A second win on the year vaults Mayer up to fifth on the Playoff grid. Thanks to adversities faced by Riley Herbst, the cut line battle has also tightened up immensely. See the full Playoff standings following Watkins Glen below.
From one hectic and carnage-filled race to another, Daytona is on deck for Xfinity teams. The Wawa 250 Powered by Coca-Cola goes green Friday at 7:30 p.m. ET on USA, MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio Channel 90. Daytona saw an underdog break into victory lane and the Playoffs last year. Can that unpredictability repeat itself on the Florida high banks?
Written by Peter Stratta
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Photo Credit to Sean Gardner/Getty Images
