Justin Allgaier overcame a 30-point Chase deficit to win his second NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series championship, finishing seventh at Homestead-Miami Speedway. He edged out defending champion Jesse Love by 14 points, even though he never led a lap in the finale and had to deal with two right-rear tire scares, giving up points to Love in both stages.
A month ago, the title seemed way out of his reach. Allgaier started the Chase as the top seed after six regular-season wins, but then finished 17th at Darlington and 13th at World Wide Technology Raceway. He placed fourth at Bristol, but a crash in Las Vegas left him 34th and turned his 25-point lead into a 30-point deficit to Sheldon Creed after four playoff races.
Then it was the No. 7 team that turned things around for him. Allgaier finished fourth at Charlotte, third at Phoenix, fourth at Talladega, and second at Martinsville. The four straight top-five finishes moved him from behind in the standings to 22 points ahead of Love entering Homestead. Chevrolet said Allgaier erased a 31-point October deficit during this run.
Homestead forced Justin Allgaier to fight for every part of his comeback
Friday’s practice gave a glimpse of a not-so-easy finale. Allgaier finished 20th after 46 practice laps, with Anthony Alfredo leading the session. On Saturday, Allgaier qualified 11th, while Creed took the pole, Love started fourth, Carson Kvapil third, and Corey Day seventh. That meant four of the five championship contenders started ahead of the points leader.
But during the actual race, Allgaier quickly made progress. He moved up to ninth on Lap 1, and Corey Day dropped out of serious title contention on Lap 8 after contact with Rajah Caruth sent the No. 17 into the wall. After the restart, Allgaier battled with Love, Austin Hill, and Kvapil behind Creed and Sam Mayer. He reached fifth as the first stage settled into a long green-flag run.
But then hitting the wall made things harder for him and the No. 7 team as a whole.
Allgaier scraped the outside wall late in Stage 1 and thought he had a flat right-rear tire. He kept going and finished the stage in seventh, earning four points. Love finished third and got eight points, cutting Allgaier’s lead by four. Mayer won the stage and Creed finished second.
JR Motorsports put four new tires on Allgaier’s car during the break, and the No. 7 got back into the race. Creed led most of Stage 2 until Mayer passed him on Lap 79. The 2024 O’Reilly Series champion was running fourth when Jeb Burton spun on Lap 88, ending the stage under caution.
Allgaier earned seven points, but Love finished third again and gained another point. The championship leader had lost five points over two stages without making big mistakes.
The 40-year-old had talked all week about execution. “We’ve been putting a ton of effort into our Homestead program.” In the finale, that preparation became a test of survival.
The final stage began with Creed, Love, Brandon Jones, and Allgaier near the front. With 90 laps to go, Creed led Love, Kvapil, and Allgaier, putting four championship contenders in the top four spots. Kvapil passed Creed with 64 laps left, while Allgaier stayed in fifth and kept his title hopes steady.
Then the right-rear tire caused problems again.
Allgaier made an unscheduled green-flag pit stop with 61 laps to go because he thought his tire was flat. This stop could have ended his comeback. Three laps later, several leaders made their scheduled stops. Then Andrew Patterson crashed into the sand barrels at pit entrance with 57 laps left, and NASCAR stopped the race for cleanup.
The timing worked in Allgaier’s favor. He got back on the lead lap during the pit cycle, then pitted again during the caution for new tires and fuel. That extra stop put him in eighth for the restart with 49 laps left, but the fresh tires helped him move up on Homestead’s rough track.
Allgaier battled Mayer for third for a short time before Creed and Love passed him. With 30 laps to go, he was in sixth and still led the championship. Brent Crews moved him back to seventh, and Allgaier dropped to eighth with 15 laps left. Then Sam Mayer got a flat right-rear tire while near the front, went to pit road, and Allgaier moved back up to seventh.
Brandon Jones passed Kvapil for the lead with 14 laps left and won by 3.937 seconds. Love finished fourth and earned 49 points. Allgaier got 41 points, cutting his 22-point lead to 14, but it was enough. Creed led 99 laps, the most in the race, and finished sixth. Kvapil’s second-place finish left him 28 points behind in the final standings.
“Means more than you’ll ever know. It’s obviously not the finish we wanted tonight. Wanted to be in Victory Lane, but this team never quits,” Allgaier said.
Dale Earnhardt Jr.’s driver had dominated the regular season, watched the Chase chew through his advantage, fell 30 points behind and clawed everything back through four straight top-five finishes. Homestead gave him no victory lap. It gave him tire trouble, rivals running ahead of him and another points swing toward Love.
And yet, he survived all of it and became JR Motorsports’ first multi-series champion.