Tennessee Lottery 250
Four poles. Thirteen top-10 finishes. An average finish of 8.6. These numbers summed up Cole Custer’s first 16 races of the NASCAR Xfinity Season as he awaited his first checkered flag of 2024.
In Saturday’s one-day show at Nashville Superspeedway, Custer sat P4 in practice and qualified his Haas Automation No. 00 in P2.
Before firing engines, Custer and spotter Andy Houston discussed which lane to choose depending on where in the field the No. 00 would line up. As Custer lined up for the green flag, crew chief Jonathan Toney told his driver, “It’ll be a hot, slick one today. But this team is built for days like this. You tell us what you need and about Lap 188, we’ll go get ourselves a guitar.”
Stage 1
Coming out of Turn 1 on Lap 1, Custer was door-to-door with NASCAR Cup Series regular, Ty Gibbs. Throughout the opening lap, they stayed that way, but as drivers came to Lap 3, Custer fell in behind Gibbs.
Gibbs shot off with a 2.2 second lead throughout the opening laps as Custer battled a loose-handling racecar in P2.
As Custer hit 19 to go in the stage, he started to battle lapped traffic. In turn, AJ Allmendinger started to creep in on his bumper. With 15 to go, Allmendinger took P2 from Custer.
Four laps later, Custer noted he was still fighting a loose car. With nine to go, Brandon Jones worked his way around Custer. He managed to hold off Justin Allgaier and finished the stage P4 and earned seven stage points.
Immediately Toney and the team went to work on a game plan for adjustments.
Stage 2
Custer’s team got him off pit road first to allow him to line up P1 for the Stage 2 restart.
P4 ➡️ P1 after that fast stop for the 00! pic.twitter.com/3yIbmaQrZy
— Stewart-Haas Racing (@StewartHaasRcng) June 29, 2024
However, the No. 00 was assessed with a warning after the restart for not “maintaining speed” through the restart zone.
By Lap 19 of the stage, Custer had maintained his lead, however there was a three-way battle for P2 brewing behind him between John Hunter Nemechek, Gibbs, and Allmendinger.
Three laps later, Nemechek was closing in on Custer, but the No. 00 was giving the No. 20 a run for his money.
With 20 to go in the stage, Nemechek claimed P1 and Custer’s team started to discuss what the No. 00 was missing.
Eight laps later, the leaders once again hit lapped traffic, making for some interesting final stage laps. With six to go, Allmendinger worked his way around Custer and the SHR driver noted he was “loose in the corners.”
Custer took the green-white-checkered in P3, earning eight stage points. He gave an update on his car for the next round of adjustments.
Toney noted, “We’ll work on some air pressures and tighten the chassis a little.”
Stage 3
The No. 00 crew delivered another solid stop and got Custer off pit road second fastest. He took the start of Stage 3 from the front row in P2 with a solid push from the No. 19 of Gibbs. Unfortunately, Nemechek had the momentum and secured the lead once again.
Lap 102 saw Custer claim the lead and set sail.
Could we see the most refreshing Stone Cole of all-time?@ColeCuster is out front looking for his first win of 2024? pic.twitter.com/hHCmSnb7dV
— Xfinity Racing (@XfinityRacing) June 29, 2024
After four laps in clean air, he noted, “Little tight in, loose center.” Custer held his ground as Allmendinger slowly worked his way forward.
With 73 laps to go, Custer said, “We have more of a short run car than a long run car. Don’t be afraid to get aggressive coming up.”
Ten laps later, Custer had a rearview full of Allmendinger, but was keeping about a half-second gap between the No. 16. With 60 to go, Custer began to battle lapped traffic as he worked to keep Allmendinger far enough behind him.
Five laps later, Toney noted, “We need to be on our toes over the next several laps,” as Allmendinger slowly closed the gap.
The next lap brought out the first caution for incident as Gibbs went sliding after contact with Allgaier.
The No. 00 team went to work figuring out what Custer needed to maintain the led and ultimately, win the race.
50 to Go
With 50 to go, the pits opened and Custer came to his team for adjustments, fuel, and fresh tires. As had been the theme of the day, the crew delivered and got the No. 00 off pit road first allowing Custer to keep his hard-earned lead.
Custer took the restart with 46 to go in the race but lost the lead and fell to P6. He quickly radioed in, “Really tight!”
Over the next 15 laps, he managed to hang on to P6. As he fell to seventh, he said, “We just suck in dirty air.” He lost one more spot as Allmendinger worked his way around him with 28 to go.
As the laps ticked by, and drivers kept the race green, Custer likely resigned himself to the fact he would have to wait another week to try for the first win of the season. With 10 to go, he lost a spot to Allgaier and that P9 would be where he finished the race.
Custer radioed his team, “I’m sorry guys. I gave it everything I could. I got super tight at the end. But unbelievable job on pit road.”
Sponsor Shoutout + Driver & Team Socials
Finally, NASCAR fans know sponsors make the sport go ’round. We want to give a shoutout to Haas Automation who played a huge part of the weekend for Cole and the No. 00 team.
Be sure to give Cole Custer (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter) and Stewart-Haas Racing (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter) a follow to keep up with the latest news from the driver and team..
