Austin Dillon wins wreck-filled XFINITY race at Daytona
Austin Dillon won the Subway Firecracker 250 XFINITY Series race at Daytona International Speedway on Saturday night, surviving two huge wrecks over the final 10 laps that took out a good portion of the rest of the field.
Among those involved in the last wreck was Brian Scott, Dillon's Richard Childress Racing teammate who had led a race-high 84 laps in his No. 2 Chevrolet.
But instead of Scott going to Victory Lane for the first time in his career, it was Dillon who celebrated in the end. Elliott Sadler finished second, Chase Elliott was third and Kasey Kahne was fourth.
"This is Daytona … so many family memories here,” said Dillon, the grandson of car owner Richard Childress. "I'm just happy for my grandfather. This is the favorite win of my career."
Scott dominated most of the race. But as he was leading with four scheduled laps remaining, he tried to shoot up the track to block Sadler. Scott made the move late, was never clear of Sadler and turned himself as he clipped the No. 1 Roush Fenway Racing Ford driven by Sadler, triggering a 12-car crash.
Dillon escaped that wreck and was the leader on the restart, holding off Sadler, Elliott and Kahne down the stretch to win in s green-white-checkered finish. Sadler finished second after nearly getting taken out by Scott, and said it was a by-product of restrictor-plate racing.
"It was definitely a disappointing night for us," Sadler said. "We were in the cat-bird seat there going into the back straightaway with Joey Logano pushing us and a lot of momentum off Turn 2 and making our way to the front. I just think that Brian (Scott) or his spotter made the block call too late. I was already up to his right rear tire and he made the block too late and wrecked us.
"It wasn't intentional, just racing, but it stinks it happened to us. That is two restrictor-plate races in a row that we were in really good shape with less than four to go and couldn't pull it off. Tonight really stings because we were really fast, top four all night, and then the wreck happened. Second is our best finish of the year but it isn't what we came to Daytona to do. We will have to take it and move on.”
Earlier, Dillon also survived another huge multi-car wreck with 10 scheduled laps to go. That one was triggered when the No. 3 Chevy driven by Austin's younger brother, Ty, turned the No. 16 of Ryan Reed while attempting to bump-draft with him.
Reed's car then hit the No. 62 car of Brendan Gaughan, who in turn took out the No. 6 car of Darrell Wallace Jr. Several other cars also were collected during the massive wreck, bringing out a red flag to clean up the track.
It is Dillon's third victory of the season, but the first of his career at Daytona and also his first on a superspeedway.
Dillon also will start alongside Dale Earnhardt Jr. on the front row for Sunday night's Coke Zero 400 Sprint Cup race at Daytona. Cup qualifying was rained out earlier Saturday, but the starting grid was set according to speeds in the first Friday practice session when Dillon was second-fastest behind only Earnhardt Jr.
The Asscociated Press contributed to this report.
VIDEO: Brian Scott triggers the second of two huge wrecks over the final 10 laps of Saturday's XFINITY race
