Race Winner: Chandler Smith of Joe Gibbs Racing (Toyota)
Stage 1 Winner: Chandler Smith of Joe Gibbs Racing (Toyota)
Stage 2 Winner: Cole Custer of Stewart-Haas Racing (Ford)
SHR Race Finish:
● Cole Custer (Started 1st / Finished 5th, Running, completed 205 of 205 laps)
● Riley Herbst (Started 4th / Finished 24th, Running, completed 202 of 205 laps)
SHR Points:
● Cole Custer (3rd with 150 points, 33 out of first)
● Riley Herbst (4th with 146 points, 37 out of first)
SHR Notes:
● Custer earned his second top-five of the season and his fourth top-five in nine career NASCAR Xfinity Series starts at Phoenix.
● Custer has only finished outside of the top-12 at Phoenix once in his Xfinity Series career.
● This was Custer’s second straight top-five at Phoenix. He won at the track in November.
● Custer finished second in Stage 1 to earn nine bonus points and won Stage 2 to earn 10 more bonus points and one playoff point.
● Custer led two times for 61 laps to increase his laps-led total at Phoenix to 201.
● Herbst finished fifth in Stage 1 to earn six bonus points and fifth in Stage 2 to earn six more bonus points.
Race Notes:
● Chandler Smith won the Call 811.com Every Dig. Every Time. 200 to score his second career NASCAR Xfinity Series victory, his first of the season, and his first at Phoenix. His margin over second-place Jesse Love was .365 of a second.
● There were six caution periods for a total of 43 laps.
● Seventeen of the 38 drivers in the race finished on the lead lap.
● Smith leaves Phoenix as the championship leader with a one-point advantage over second-place Austin Hill.
Sound Bites:
“We started out pretty good, but the track lost some grip and then we struggled a little bit. Our guys did a great job staying with it all day, and our pit crew did an amazing job. It’s frustrating. Obviously, we want to win, but overall, it was a really good points day for us. We just have to keep working on it. I think we’re missing something just a little bit. We just have to keep trying to work on it and get a little bit more of that potential out of it.” –Cole Custer, driver of the No. 00 Haas Automation Ford Mustang
“It’s a bummer. We had a strong day building with our No. 98 Monster Energy Ford Mustang. I got stage points and looked to be able to run up front in that final stage. One incident derailed all of that, though. I hate it for my team. They worked so hard and were able to get me back out on track to finish the race at least. We’ll learn from it and regroup during the off week.” –Riley Herbst, driver of the No. 98 Monster Energy Ford Mustang
Next Up:
The next event on the NASCAR Xfinity Series schedule is the Focused Health 250 on Saturday, March 23 at the Circuit of the Americas (COTA) in Austin, Texas. The race begins at 5 p.m. EDT with live coverage provided by FS1 and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio.
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