Creed On Las Vegas Top 10: ‘That Was A Fight’

Sheldon Creed (00) battles Kyle Sieg Saturday at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. (John Harrelson/Nigel Kinrade Photography)

LAS VEGAS – The box score might not have fully reflected it, but Sheldon Creed found race day speed at Las Vegas Motor Speedway to advance from 23rd to 10th in Saturday’s LiUNA! 300.

The fourth-year NASCAR Xfinity Series veteran struggled in qualifying, starting 23rd in the No. 00 Friends of Jaclyn Foundation Ford Mustang, but quickly advanced 11 positions in the first 45 laps to put himself into contention for a more-solid result.

Creed worked his way up to ninth by the second stage break at lap 90 to add two stage points to his regular season total.

From there, he made it as high as eighth during the second half of the race, but couldn’t quite match the speed of eventual winner Justin Allgaier and the other front runners as his car transitioned from loose to tight in the final stage.

Still, however, he hung on for his second top 10 of the season by crossing in 10th place at the checkered flag – despite falling one lap down just before the finish. Only nine cars ended on the lead lap Saturday.

Las Vegas marked Creed’s best result since his third-place effort in February’s season opener at Daytona (Fla.) Int’l Speedway. It was also his fourth top 10 in seven starts in Sin City.

“That was a fight for sure,” said Creed. “It’s kind of hard to make adjustments on the race car when [the handling] is swinging as much as it was throughout the day. Just a hard-fought 10th place right there.”

Creed stands seventh in the regular season standings through five races, 56 points behind series leader Allgaier but 30 ahead of the provisional playoff cut line with plenty of racing still to come.

“It’s a long season,” noted the Alpine, Calif., native. “We’re not quite where we want to be yet from a consistency standpoint, but we’re making gains, and I know we’ll be contending for wins soon. JT (crew chief Jonathan Toney) and I share the same vision for what we want this season to be; it’s just a matter of working through the process and taking the right steps to improve each week.”

Creed and the rest of the Xfinity Series field head next to Homestead-Miami (Fla.) Speedway, where he earned a track-best fifth place finish last October, when the track was in the semifinal round of the playoffs.

Broadcast coverage of the Hard Rock Bet 300 is slated for Saturday, March 22 at 4 p.m. ET, live on The CW, the Motor Racing Network, and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, channel 90.