After gambling on his talent level, pooling the sponsor money that allowed him to race a full XFINITY season with JD Motorsports last year into two races for JGR this year, Preece proved Saturday that he has what it takes to compete – and win – at the premier level of the sport.
The former NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour champion and Berlin, Conn. native led a race-high 141 laps, including the final 78, en route to victory in a race that was pushed to 254 laps due to the overtime finish.
“I thought this race would never end,” Preece admitted. “Nothing’s going to beat today.”
“Right there (at the end), I was a little nervous. He (Benjamin) was right next to me … but I was able to clear him and get into (Turn) 1 and I said ‘Alright, you know what … I’m not going to give him a chance to get in there and get to me,’ so I just took the bottom. I still can’t believe it. This feels amazing.”
Benjamin’s last-gasp effort off Turn 4 to pull back alongside Preece and challenge for the win was nearly enough, but more importantly, the Easley, S.C. young gun finally got a result indicative of his speed and talent in finishing as the runner-up.
Despite four front row qualifying efforts in his four starts with the Gibbs team, Saturday marked Benjamin’s career-best XFINITY finish after three crashes hampered his earlier appearances at Richmond, Pocono and Iowa.
“That was a lot of fun there,” Benjamin said of the battle with Preece. “It just hurt that we didn’t get the win, but I’ll take second any day. We needed a good run and I had a lot of fun and learned a lot in that race. I learned more in that race than I have in any of the previous ones … so there’s a lot to take away from it. And, congratulations to Ryan Preece. He’s worked really hard too, and he earned that win today.”
Brian Scott charged up through the outside lane late to finish third, followed by Brennan Poole and Cole Custer.
J.J. Yeley finished a season-best sixth for TriStar Motorsports, as the team races for the remainder of the season in memory of their late leader and founder Mark Smith.
Daniel Hemric, Blake Koch, William Byron and Brandon Jones rounded out the top 10.
Justin Allgaier, who led 106 laps in the middle of the race and won the second stage, was the only driver who stayed out with 80 laps to go after a caution for Spencer Gallagher hitting the Turn 3 wall.
Both Allgaier and crew chief Jason Burdett were banking on a late-race caution flag coming out that would allow the No. 7 to pit for tires and charge back through the field, but they had to stop for fuel under green with 23 laps left, just a few short moments before Hornish’s trouble slowed the pace.
By that point, Allgaier was two laps down and out of contention to contend for the win. He finished 20th.
The NASCAR XFINITY Series returns to action on Aug. 5 at Watkins Glen Int’l, with the running of the Zippo 200 at the Glen. Joey Logano is the two-time defending winner of the event.
Full race results can be viewed on the next page…
