Taylor Gray, Noah Gragson collect big wins at Phoenix

The NASCAR Xfinity Series concluded the West Coast Swing with a trip to the desert at Phoenix International Raceway for the United Rentals 200. Trevor Bayne ended up with his first Xfinity pole since August 2014. 18-year-old Parker Retzlaff also made his Xfinity Series debut driving for Ryan Sieg.

The ARCA Menards Series and ARCA Menards Series West raced the day before with the checkered flag falling for Taylor Gray of David Gilliland Racing, just days after tragedy struck. Earlier this week, the transporter that carried the team’s car crashed in Texas on Tuesday, killing hauler driver Steven Stotts and injuring two other DGR employees. The ARCA cars carried a sticker on their cars honoring the life of Steven Stotts. Team owner David Gilliland wasn’t sure whether to race or not, but decided to, in which ultimately gave the emotional win to his team. Taylor Gray dedicated the win for Steven and the two employees that were injured, saying it was hard to celebrate the win.

“This win is for them,” Gray said to Bob Pockrass. “Not for anybody else. All the glory to them. They went through a horrific thing.”

For the NASCAR Xfinity Series, drama took place before the green flag dropped when pole-sitter Trevor Bayne when he had issues getting his car fired off. His crew was able to quickly fix the issue and go back out to start on the pole. Anthony Alfredo also could not get his car fired and was having issues all day to where they did not turn a lap in practice or qualifying. The #23 Chevrolet went behind the wall and would join the race later 50 laps down. The first caution occurred when Riley Herbst had a hard wreck in turns three and four, as he lost control of his #98 Ford. At the end of stage one, Trevor Bayne sent his #18 Toyota into turns three and four and beat Noah Gragson in a photo finish that almost resembled the finish at Phoenix back in November.

On lap 55, Ty Gibbs and Josh Berry made contact as this sent last week’s winner, Gibbs, spinning to bring out the caution. Luckily, no one else was involved in the incident. Gibbs wasn’t too pleased with Berry, as heard on the FOX Broadcast audio,

“What the hell Berry?”

Berry went down on the bottom and slid up into Gibbs, turning the #54 Toyota. Gibbs would come back to finish sixth in the race. Things stayed calm for the rest of stage two, as Noah Gragson took stage two. After that, there was no stopping the #9 Bass Pro Chevrolet, as Noah Gragson would get his first win of 2022 at Phoenix, which could be very beneficial for his team as they could return to this track in November contending for a championship. Brandon Jones finished second, Josh Berry in third, Trevor Bayne in fourth, and John Hunter Nemechek in fifth. Gragson would go on to celebrate with this crew by climbing the catch fence.

The NASCAR Cup Series is up next on Sunday, March 13th at 3:30 pm EST at Phoenix. Ryan Blaney will lead the 36 car field to the green flag for the Ruoff Mortgage 500 at Phoenix. Hendrick Motorsports looks like the team to beat so far, but will that change on Sunday?