Strong Bristol Start Leads To 11th-Place Finish For Alfredo

Anthony Alfredo in action at Bristol (Tenn.) Motor Speedway. (Jacob Seelman photo)

BRISTOL, Tenn. – A final finish of 11th in Friday night’s Food City 300 didn’t reflect just how strong Anthony Alfredo and Our Motorsports were at times inside The Last Great Colosseum.

Alfredo, who qualified third and restarted on the front row at one point during the early portion of the NASCAR Xfinity Series regular season finale, earned a top-five placing in stage one and appeared to have plenty of speed to contend with at Bristol Motor Speedway.

The only bad part? A late caution just before the end of the second stage, when Justin Allgaier spun on the backstretch after contact with Sheldon Creed, allowed many frontrunners to pit for the final time and flip the stage to gain track position.

Alfredo and crew chief Joshua Graham were on a different strategy, however, and as a result found themselves mired back in traffic to start the final stage after pitting during the second stage break.

He lined up 14th for a lap-180 restart and simply found himself struggling to complete passes on the low side of the .533-mile concrete high banks.

The 25-year-old from Ridgefield, Conn., was able to advance back to 11th by the checkered flag, and while he lamented not being able to “finish where we deserved,” he was pleased with the speed of the No. 5 DUDE Wipes Dump-kin Spice Chevrolet Camaro nonetheless.

“We had one of the fastest cars here, for sure,” Alfredo said after the race. “It was just a track position race toward the end. That first stage, we focused on getting points and ended up fifth in the stage. I couldn’t run the top, though, so that was hurting me. But we were probably the best car here on the bottom, so I could at least maintain or gain in clean air.

“When you’re racing side by side at Bristol, it’s hard to hold off the top or get a pass done cleanly down low,” he added. “Once the second stage got going, at that point we were committed to the strategy of playing the long game, but a lot of guys flipped it and got lucky with a late caution at the end of stage two and the early caution to start stage three.

“That killed us because we set ourselves up to compete for the win at the end of this thing, and we simply weren’t able to fully cycle the strategies. We brought a really strong car, though, and I’m excited and optimistic about that as we go into the last seven races of the season.”

Alfredo nearly came away with his seventh top-10 finish of the year after a fierce late-race battle with longtime veteran A.J. Allmendinger.

“We were mired in traffic, but man, the car was still so fast. I drove all the way to the top 10 [in stage three] and I was battling A.J. so hard the last few laps, but I was trying to race him with respect,” Alfredo noted. “Obviously, I wasn’t sure what the regular season championship and all that looked like, so I just wanted to be respectful, but it’s still a great night for our team to qualify top three and race up front all night long.

“That’s a good night for what we do and what we have to work with compared to the big teams.”

With yet another strong showing under his belt, Alfredo believes Our Motorsports is starting to show its potential on a more consistent basis.

“Absolutely we’re continuing to build,” he affirmed. “What we lack on the big tracks, as far as aerodynamics and technology, isn’t as big a deal here [at the short tracks]. But traffic’s huge at this place in particular, and you saw a lot of good cars go to the back and struggle to get back to the front without cycling up there via strategy. I really just feel like the short tracks give us the opportunity to show what we can do as a team, because we definitely have less resources.

“The short tracks and superspeedways are my favorites to go to; both of them fit my wheelhouse, but I think it’s also because I’ve put so much work into studying and getting better at them because they’re my best shots to win,” he continued. “We do go to an intermediate [track] next week, so we’ll see what we can do, but I appreciate everyone's support and look forward to finishing this year strong.”

While Alfredo didn’t qualify for this year’s Xfinity Series playoffs, he sits 15th in the driver standings with seven races to go and is still within striking distance of a career-best 14th place points finish.

He has two top fives and six top 10s in the season’s first 26 races, which both improve on his previous totals from his season with Our Motorsports back in 2022.

Alfredo will continue the Xfinity Series season at Kansas Speedway during the Kansas Lottery 300, with broadcast coverage set for Saturday, Sept. 28 at 4 p.m. ET on CW Network, the Motor Racing Network, and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, channel 90.