Noah Gragson Wins in a Wild Finish at Darlington

Sparks flew in the closing laps of the NASCAR Xfinity Series race at Darlington between Sheldon Creed, Kyle Larson, and Sheldon Creed. Gragson was the one to clear the smoke first to grab his fourth win of the 2022 Season. Sheldon Creed had the lead late in the race after a round of green flag pit stops, but Larson and Gragson were able to catch up to Creed just in time to make it a three-way battle for the win. Creed and Larson ran side-by-side in the final two laps and on the final lap, Creed tried to keep the lead despite driving up against the outside wall for most of that lap. Noah Gragson managed to gather control of his No. 9 Chevrolet and take it to the checkered flag first for the win.

Gragson felt a bit dazed after climbing out of his car to celebrate, as he had to unzip his firesuit after climbing the fence, admitting that the smoke from the burnout made him dizzy. The race ended under the lights when the race had a 2-hour and 37 minutes rain delay.

 “I was breathing that in and got pretty nauseous and tunnel vision,” Gragson said. “I felt like I was about to pass out.”

“Sheldon Creed was really fast. I watched, during that rain delay, him running the top in (Turns) 1 and 2, and I knew there was a lot of speed there.”

Sheldon Creed, despite losing two tires in the final two turns, was able to finish second, now putting him in a spot to make the playoffs, just 16 points out from making the playoffs.

“I was trying to hold on,” Creed said after the race. “I had a really fast car. It was just a little too free to run their speed there at the end. They could run up the hill in 1 and 2 and then really get a good run down the backstretch. I had to stay really low to keep the rear of the car underneath me.

“I was hoping they were going to get to racing behind me. When Kyle got next to me, my only opportunity was to side-draft as hard as I could. We got that wall, and I felt the right-front start to go down (as I was) going down the backstretch.”

As for Kyle Larson, he finished fifth behind Justin Allgaier and AJ Allmendinger.

“It was a lot of fun,” said Larson after the race. “I was just trying to be patient as I caught them two. … I was able to get by Noah, and I saw Sheldon was really loose in front of me, so I was just trying to stay patient behind him.”

“He was racing really hard for his first win. It was just a lot of fun from all of our seats. Crazy to be a part of a finish like that.”

Noah Gragson led four times in the race for a total of 82 laps. Ty Gibbs, Christopher Bell, Josh Berry, John Hunter Nemechek, and Austin Hill rounded out the top 10.

Two races remain in the Xfinity Series regular season as they head next to Kansas Speedway on Saturday, September 10th at 3 PM EST on USA/MRN/SiriusXM NASCAR.