LAS VEGAS, Nev.: Noah Gragson’s impressive start to the 2022 NASCAR Xfinity Series season continued in Saturday’s Alsco Uniforms 300, but the Las Vegas, Nev. native lost the opportunity of scoring the biggest win of his career on a restart in the closing laps of the race.
Gragson’s No. 9 Bass Pro Shops | TrueTimber | Black Riffle Coffee Chevrolet Camaro led a whopping 52 laps throughout the 200-mile event including bringing the field back to green for a restart at Lap 196, but without help from his fellow Chevrolet teammate Daniel Hemric, Gragson saw the No. 54 Toyota Supra of Ty Gibbs carry the momentum on the bottom of the race track after a push from Gragson’s teammate Justin Allgaier which was enough to propel the Joe Gibbs Racing driver past Gragson and lead the final laps of the race.
The JR Motorsports driver put on a tremendous fight to try and swipe the lead away from Gibbs in the closing laps of the race, but Gragson’s car couldn’t overcome the deficit of dirt air and had to settle for second at his hometown track.
The race finished under caution as the cars of Bayley Currey and CJ McLaughlin connected on the frontstretch after the leaders were exiting Turn 1.
After the race, a dejected Gragson climbed from his car – insisting that he was beat at his own game.
“Obviously, I wanted to be in Victory Lane, but it could be a hell of a lot worse,” said Gragson. “We kinda just beat at our own game there. Restarts just came up short. I felt like he was rolling, but I guess that’s the box that we’re in. 50th anniversary Bass Pro Shops Camaro was really good.
“Thanks to Johnny Morris, Z-man, JP, everybody who helps this program, Rusty at TrueTimber and the guys over at Black Riffle Coffee, appreciate it.”
Gragson felt that Gibbs perhaps jumped the final restart which allowed him to have an advantage, but NASCAR didn’t see it that way.
“He got warned earlier in the race for kinda doing something similar to that, but I don’t know,” added Gragson. “Just, need to be better, you know. Congrats to them. We will keep working hard. I’m thankful for this team led by Luke Lambert. Yeah, we’ll come back stronger next week.”
After three races, Gragson holds an average finish of 2.33 heading to Phoenix (Ariz.) Raceway after finishing third in the season-opener at Daytona and carrying back-to-back runner-up finishes at Auto Club (Calif.) Speedway and Las Vegas and while the 23-year-old is satisfied with the start of the season, his hunger to win is evident.
“It’s a really good start,” sounded Gragson. “Obviously, we want to be in Victory Lane, but it could be a hell of a lot worse, but we got a lot of things on my end that I can work on to be better and keep improving execution wise.
“I’m disappointed in today, but a third and two seconds, I’ll take it.”
As for Phoenix, “I think it will be alright,” he said. “We’ll see. It will be our first short track with Luke (Lambert, crew chief) but he’s brought fast race cars so far. He’s bad ass.”
Follow Chris Knight on Twitter @Knighter01.
