By Jerry Jordan, Editor
HOMESTEAD, FL – Heading into the final race of the season and battling for the 2019 NASCAR Xfinity Series Championship, Cole Custer had already received good news that he would be stepping up to the NASCAR Cup Series next year but he wouldn’t cap off the weekend with a title – coming up one position short to Tyler Reddick.
The final four of Christopher Bell, Justin Allgaier, Custer and the eventual champ, Reddick, battled throughout the race and were at one point, back-to-back-to-back-to-back. Custer was able to lead 15 laps but a loose wheel sent him to the pits for an unscheduled pitstop. As he clicked off laps, Custer keyed his radio to tell his crew chief he had a “vibration.” After a few more laps, he made the commitment to pit.
“Yeah, I think there’s just nothing you can really change about it, so you just kind of take it how it is and make it the best you can,” Custer said, after the race. “It worked out good because we were able to get our lap back and then kind of race our way up through there, and it was still we had to adjust on the car a lot throughout the day. But it was just something – I mean, freaking out is not going to help you at all, so you might as well try and take your lumps and move on.”
Custer fought back, regained his lap and aside from getting into the wall with a handful of laps to go, he was fast and he was doing all he could to chase down Tyler Reddick.
“It was a cool race, I mean, the thee of us were really close there for a while,” Custer told Kickin’ the Tires. “I don’t know, I could match Tyler’s (Reddick) lap time up there but he made a good move with a slide job, uh, I just couldn’t get him back. I could, kind of, match his lap times but I couldn’t stay close but I would start trying to push harder to close the gap somehow and I got into the fence a little bit. You know, it sucks but at the same time, we can move on from it and we had a good day.
“There was a lot we had to come back from today, honestly. I am proud of that. I mean, we were so close there at the end.”