NASCAR Xfinity Series Predictions at Road America
Ty Gibbs acknowledging the crowd following his win last year.
The NASCAR Xfinity Series heads back to a freshly repaved Road America this Saturday for the Road America 180 at 3PM EST on USA.
Ty GIbbs won after a clean last lap battle with Kyle Larson, but was overshadowed by Noah Gragson intentionally wrecking Sage Karam, triggering a 13 car road block and being penalized 30 driver points and fined $35,000.
AJ Allmedinger ran 6th in this race last year, but enters as the favorite to win this Saturday. His lone win at this track came in 2013, since then he’s finished 2nd in 2020 and 4th in 2021. He’ll be looking to add another Xfinity win to his resume at this 4.08 mile long road course.
Cole Custer enters as the favorite amongst the Xfinity regulars in the field. He’s won twice this season, both coming on road courses in Portland and the Chicago Street Course. Custer’s worst finish at Road America came last season in 25th after getting caught up in a late race crash. Outside of that, Custer’s finished inside the Top 10 in his previous three races. Keep a lookout for the #00.
Sheldon Creed hasn’t scored a Top 10 since Portland, but that will change on Saturday. His only finish at Road America was 27th after suffering a blown engine. On road courses this season, Creed has finished no worse than 11th at Sonoma and the Chicago Street Course. Expect the #2 to contend for the win this weekend.
John Hunter Nemechek has been strong on road courses this season but his finishes don’t show for it. He’s only had four races this season where he didn’t finish inside the Top 10, two of those races came at COTA (27th) and Sonoma (16th). But his last road course race he finished 2nd, and he’s looking for a Top 5 run after finishing in 32nd last week from a crash at Pocono. Don’t be surprised if he’s hoisting the trophy in victory lane on Saturday.
Josh Berry enters as a longshot to win this Saturday, and it’s worth taking a chance on. Last week Berry led 51 laps, the most laps led at Pocono, and lost on the last lap after a bad restart and contact with Austin Hill and Sam Mayer. It was the most complete race from the #8 car all season, and they’re hitting their strides at the right time. He finished 3rd in his first race at this track last year, he’ll be looking to improve that finish by two positions this weekend.