BROOKLYN, Mich. – Ty Gibbs led the final 16 green flag laps Saturday to win the NASCAR Xfinity Series race at Michigan International Speedway.
Thanks to help from lapped traffic following a sequence of green flag pit stops, the 19-year-old Gibbs beat Justin Allgaier by 1.1 seconds for his fifth win of the season and his ninth in 39 career starts.
Gibbs won on a day that appeared to be heading for domination on the part of JR Motorsports after Noah Gragson, who finished third, swept the first two stages after leading 40 laps around the 2-mile track. But it was Gibbs who led a race-high 54 laps in a caution free final stage to get the win.
“We had a very fast Monster Energy GR Supra. I’m so excited,” Gibbs said. “I think this style of racing shows the strategy and the pit stops. It’s pretty spread out. But my guys did a great job and the pit crew worked so hard. I workout with them during the week and I see how hard they work, every one of them.”
Allgaier finished second, giving him his 10th top-10 finish through 22 races and his fifth in a row.
“It was just kind of a few hairs that kind of put us behind,” Allgaier said on pit road after the race.
Allgaier said the “difference maker” was the green flag pit stops that began with 25 laps to go when he and Brandon Jones were the first to pit.
“I came down because we were catching kind of a big group a lot of lapped cars and when I came back out off the pit road, I merged literally right behind the same group of cars,” Allgaier said. “That really was a difference maker. I almost would have been better off the pass him on old tires and then come later, but how do you know right? You hope that you leapfrog and you get out in front, but we didn’t do that.”
The top five was completed by Jones and Austin Hill.
Hill’s top five, his eight consecutive top 10, came hours after he made his first laps in a NASCAR Cup ahead of his series debut in Sunday’s FireKeepers Casino 400.
A disappointed Hill blamed his own call for a change on pit road “that I should’t have” for not finishing better.
“Stage one we freed up and beginning of stage two I lost track position, I didn’t have a really good restart,” Hill said. “Also I was really free that run, so I told them to tighten it back up and then they tightened me back up. Once I got the clean air, we just overstepped the balance a lot, just got way too tight.”
After starting from the pole, Gragson held serve on the field with ease until Allgaier started bearing down on him around Lap 20.
By Lap 22 Allgaier was within two car lengths as they got closer to the back of the field. They cleared the initial wave on Lap 25 with Gragson still leading. Gragson would survive to win the stage over Allgaier, Sammy Smith, Allmendinger and Gibbs.
It was Gragson’s ninth stage win of the season.
Kyle Weatherman surprised in qualifying when he put Jesse Iwuji’s No. 34 car eighth on the starting grid. But by Lap 11, after avoiding a wreck with Josh Berry in Turn 4, Weatherman had fallen to 16th, where he’d finish the stage and the race.
During the stage break, Allmendinger reported to his team that his cool suit had failed. This marked the second week in a row this had occurred. It happened in the Cup race at Indianapolis and saw Allmendinger collapse from heat exhaustion after exiting his car.
In the pits, Gragson was the first off followed by Allmendinger, Sammy Smith, Gragson and Hill.
The second stage went green on Lap 37.
Gragson initially lost the lead to Allmendinger on the first lap. But the next time by, Allgaier took advantage of the leaders racing side-by-side to take the lead, passing Gragson and Allmendinger on the outside as they went down the frontstretch.
The first caution for cause came on Lap 42 for two separate incidents between CJ McLaughlin and Matt Mills as they exited Turn 2.
On the Lap 45 restart, Allgaier retained the lead over Smith. The Joe Gibbs Racing driver reeled him in over the next few laps and with 10 laps to go in the stage, he was within a car length of Allgaier.
Smith’s surge had just died down with eight to go when David Starr spun exiting Turn 2 to bring out the caution.
When the pits opened, Allgaier and Smith were among the 16 cars to elect make a visit. That gave the lead to Allmendinger, who was now ahead of Gragson. But after the choose rule, it was Allmendinger and Landon Cassill on the front row going into the two-lap shootout to finish the stage.
The Kaulig Racing teammate would stay side-by-side until Allmendinger got clear in Turn 3 and Gragson took over second.
On the final lap, Gragson got underneath Allmendinger in Turn 3 and initiated a drag race to the finish line, where Gragson beat Allmendinger by half a car. The top five after two stages was Gragson, Allmendinger, Berry, Cassill and Ryan Sieg.
Allgaier was 13th.
After the stage ended, Gragson said he threw up inside his helmet after he had held his breath while racing Allmendinger.
“I don’t know why I throw up, but I threw up inside the helmet again,” Gragson said. “I don’t know if my heart rate is high or what it is.”
Noah Gragson finished third today.
— Daniel McFadin (@danielmcfadin) August 6, 2022
He threw up inside his helmet after stage 2 after holding his breath while racing Alllmendinger.#NASCAR pic.twitter.com/uXC7vdzwnx
After pit stops, Gibbs and Hill restarted ahead of Allgaier in row two when the race resumed.
With 53 laps to go, Sam Mayer had to pit for damage to his left front from contact with Smith on the restart. Two laps later, Allgaier got by Hill to take second. Gibbs had a 2.1 second lead at the time.
With 41 laps to go, Gibbs was told by his team that he had picked up a piece of debris on his grille. Two laps later he was able to use the No. 02 car of Blake Perkins to suck the debris off.
Green flag pits stop began with 25 laps to go, with Allgaier and Jones the first to make trips to pit road.
Gibbs followed the next lap and when he returned to the track he was ahead of Allgaier.
Click here for the race results.