Alfredo Perseveres To Earn Dash 4 Cash Payday At Dover

Anthony Alfredo celebrates winning the Dash 4 Cash bonus money at Dover Motor Speedway. (HHP/Jim Fluharty photo)

DOVER, Del. – After his third straight top-10 finish in the NASCAR Xfinity Series, perhaps it shouldn’t have been surprising that Anthony Alfredo earned the final $100,000 Dash 4 Cash payout of the year Saturday.

Alfredo finished ninth in the BetRivers 200 at Dover Motor Speedway, driving the No. 5 DUDE Wipes Chevrolet Camaro to a solid – if uneventful – day at the Monster Mile.

However, as his competitors in the Dash 4 Cash program – Ryan Sieg, Jesse Love, and Riley Herbst – all fell by the wayside due to various maladies, Alfredo kept his car straight and out of trouble despite a “chaotic” double-overtime finish.

The quartet earned their shots at the money Saturday by virtue of their finishes from Talladega (Ala.) Superspeedway the week prior, with a season-best finish of third putting Alfredo in contention for the first time in the bonus program’s 16th year.

Sieg was the first of the foursome to encounter issues, as his car caught fire in turn two just 26 laps into the race, forcing the Georgia driver to quickly climb from the machine and call it an afternoon.

Love’s race unraveled on lap 104, when eventual race winner Ryan Truex washed up into the side of his car and caused a flat left-rear tire. That led to an unscheduled green-flag pit stop that buried Love two laps down and eliminated him from contention.

Herbst held control of the money spot late in the going but spun inside of seven laps to go coming off turn four, sparking a seven-car crash that led to the first of two overtime attempts.

The Las Vegas native suffered damage after contact with Kyle Sieg and never recovered after that.

That left Alfredo alone in the top 10 in the final laps, allowing him to remain steady and cruise to one of the most meaningful finishes of his Xfinity Series career.

“Man, that was chaotic,” admitted Alfredo. “We came into this race knowing we were the underdog. I’m sure a lot of people ruled us out; we don’t have any technical support or a [Cup] team alliance. We’re all by ourselves out there. But we’ve been doing a lot with a little and punching above our weight this year, so we knew if we put ourselves in position, you know, that anything could happen.

“In this case it was just about staying skid-mark free thanks to DUDE Wipes,” Alfredo added, eliciting chuckles at the trademark reference to his longtime sponsor. “We stayed out of trouble and were able to be the first one there at the end out of those we were racing against. The money’s kind of overwhelming us right now. It’s crazy [for us] to win the Dash 4 Cash, just because of what we were up against.”

Alfredo and the underdog Our Motorsports team have continually overachieved in recent weeks, but their effort Saturday was almost quiet by comparison.

It wasn’t about having a fast race car, nor was it about a wild strategy call. Alfredo’s path to the bonus money was just about running his own race and staying in it as his competition faltered.

“It was definitely a grind,” admitted Alfredo, who qualified _ but had to drop to the rear on the initial start due to an unapproved pre-race adjustment. “To come out of here [in] P9 is a big deal. A top-10 [finish] at a place like Dover is huge for our team in the big picture, but this Dash 4 Cash means a lot to us. We’re super thankful for [series sponsor] Xfinity putting it on in the first place.

“There are only four opportunities to [win the bonus money] a year, and just to be a part of it was awesome, let alone actually win it. That’s still unbelievable to me.”

It was Alfredo’s fifth top-10 finish in 10 races this season, moving his average finish to a solid 13.5, and his career-best mark at Dover’s high-banked, one-mile concrete oval.

Saturday also bumped the 25-year-old native of Ridgefield, Conn., up to 10th in regular season points and tied him with Sammy Smith for 11th on the provisional playoff grid – 15 points ahead of the cut line.

That meant there was a lot to be proud of for a driver and team that used their first appearance in the Xfinity Series’ annual bonus program as a driving force in their springtime momentum.

“Coming into this race, that was our motivation,” Alfredo said of the Dash 4 Cash opportunity. “It wasn’t just something to be a part of. This is huge; I mean, people don’t understand how small our budget is compared to these bigger teams. People overlook that because we’ve been running so well the last three weeks. … It’s funny, when we don’t run well, people say ‘Well, they’re not supposed to because they’re a small team.’ But when we are running well, they won’t accept the fact that we did.

“We knew that if we could pull this off, we could invest it into our team to be that much better,” he added. “We have a lot of amazing partners that are already supporting us and growing with us, and we have a lot of new stuff in the works too, as far as sponsorships. An opportunity like this, to be talked about and to win [the bonus money], this kind of exposure will hopefully help the phone ring Monday morning. In all reality, it’s going to help us improve our program.

“We have a small shop with not a lot of stuff and not a lot of people, but we’re all dedicated, hard-working, and we want [to succeed] more than anyone.”

Alfredo and the rest of the Xfinity Series field will get a week off to regroup before returning to action on Saturday, May 11 at Darlington (S.C.) Raceway for the Crown Royal Purple Bag Project 200.

Coverage of the 11th race of the Xfinity Series season will air at 1:30 p.m. ET, live on FS1, the Motor Racing Network, and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, channel 90.