Corey Day Holds Off Love for 2nd Straight NASCAR Chase Win
· Yahoo Sports
CONCORD, N.C. -- Corey Day held off Jesse Love for his second straight win in the Chase for the NASCAR O'Reilly Auto Parts Series championship postseason.
Day led three times for 55 laps, including 45 laps en route to winning the first stage and the final 10 laps en route to winning his fourth race of the NOAPS season. He also won the week before, at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
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Before Las Vegas, Day was 92 points behind leader Sheldon Creed. Now, he is just seven behind Creed.
Closest to Creed is Love, who led a race-high five times for 80 laps. Love didn't have the fastest car overall in Sunday night's Blue Cross NC 300. However, he had the fastest pit crew and the best car on the short runs that defined the finish of the race.
Love led for 23 laps at the start of the first stage before Justin Allgaier took control. Then, Love took it back during the second stage break and kept it as two cautions quickly fell at the start of the final stage.
Allgaier finally found his way to the front again when the race went green for 33 laps. Allgaier took the lead in the final 10 laps of the green flag run before his pit crew turned the tables on Love's crew, retaining the lead with 42 to go instead of Love getting it.
However, Allgaier led 19 laps before his car didn't agree with the set of tires and faded. Love took over but lost control on the late-race restart to Day.
TOP-10 FINISHERS (Lap 200): Corey Day (Led three times for 55 laps), Jesse Love (led five times for 80 laps), Sheldon Creed, Justin Allgaier (led three times for 54 laps), Carson Brown, Brandon Jones, Austin Hill, Anthony Alfredo, Taylor Gray (led two times for two laps), Brennan Poole.
Chase driver Sam Mayer finished 24th after a late-race incident with Jeremy Clements. Both drivers ran inside the top-10 for much of the day before that.
Also finishing outside of the top-10 were Chase drivers Parker Retzlaff (12th), Sammy Smith (16th), Carson Kvapil (32nd) and Rajah Caruth (36th).
Kvapil went to the garage and fell 29 laps down due to an issue in the final stage. Meanwhile, Caruth had seemingly a similar issue and brought out a caution on lap 121 for an incident, according to timing and scoring.
STAGE 1 TOP-10 (Lap 45): Corey Day, Jesse Love, Sam Mayer, Justin Allgaier, Carson Kvapil, Austin Hill, Brent Crews, Jeremy Clements, Taylor Gray, Parker Retzlaff.
STAGE TWO TOP-10 (LAP 90): Justin Allgaier, Jesse Love, Taylor Gray, Sam Mayer, Brent Crews, Austin Hill, Corey Day, Carson Kvapil, Sammy Smith, Sheldon Creed.
Points after Charlotte after rain moved the race to Sunday night and heading to Phoenix Raceway next Saturday:
Creed 2294, Love -2, Day -7, Allgaier -15, Kvapil -40, Mayer -59, Gray -87, Hill -94, Smith -106, Retzlaff -126, Jones -141, Caruth -180.