Mayer Confident In ROVAL Chances Despite Failed Appeal

Sam Mayer (HHP/Jacy Norgaard photo)

CHARLOTTE, N.C. – The upcoming Drive for the Cure 250 weekend at the Charlotte Motor Speedway ROVAL carries with it a sense of déjà vu with it for Sam Mayer.

Mayer comes into the race at the recently reconfigured 2.28-mile, 17-turn road course – which utilizes portions of the banked 1.5-mile oval – 13 points below the elimination line for the Round of 12 in the NASCAR Xfinity Series playoffs, meaning he’ll likely need to win Saturday to advance in the postseason.

The 21-year-old from Franklin, Wis., has been here before, though.

In fact, it’s nearly the exact same scenario as Mayer faced a year ago, when he took his No. 1 Chevrolet Camaro to victory lane at the ROVAL to propel himself from below the cut into the Round of 8.

Mayer didn’t draw this year’s tenuous playoff position up this way, however, by any means.

After crossing the finish line 16th in last weekend’s Xfinity Series race at Talladega (Ala.) Superspeedway, Mayer was subsequently disqualified from the final results when his car failed post-race inspection for being too low in the rear.

Instead of scoring 24 points and heading to the ROVAL with a 13-point playoff buffer, Mayer left Talladega with a single point and 13 points outside the advancement threshold.

An appeal Wednesday to the National Motorsports Appeals Panel, in an effort to have the DQ overturned, was unsuccessful – meaning Mayer’s situation now is what it is entering the final leg of the opening playoff round.

But considering Mayer watched JR Motorsports teammate Sammy Smith catapult himself into the Round of 8 at Talladega last week in identical fashion to how Mayer did so a year ago at the ROVAL, he has little doubt that his team and his race car are capable of duplicating the feat again.

“I’m definitely making an unfortunate habit out of being in close to must-win or must-win scenarios,” Mayer told Motorsports Hotspot by phone Wednesday following the appeal. “But we have done it [and advanced] before, and I have a lot of confidence we can do it again.

“My team always brings great cars and I’m comfortable with the track, so it’s a recipe for success. We just have to go do it.”

In upholding NASCAR’s disqualification of Mayer, the three-member appeals panel found that “NASCAR used standard inspection procedures at Talladega Superspeedway on Oct. 5 on the No. 1 NXS car and found Rule 14.17.3.2.2.2 in violation.”

Team co-owner Dale Earnhardt Jr. later took to X (formerly Twitter) to better explain why the height violation occurred in the first place, after a thorough investigation by the organization.

“The rear clip on the [No.] 1 was bent from a series of aggressive bump drafting incidents Saturday. We had photo evidence of the kinks in the tubing in a chassis that was previously certified, along with body scans before and after the event,” Earnhardt wrote. “There isn’t much we can do about the clip possibly getting destroyed in these races. It happens.

“Unfortunately, we weren’t able to convince the panel of our unenviable situation.”

Mayer isn’t focusing on the past at this point, though.

“The appeal is done now; it’s in the past and we can’t change it … so we move forward,” he noted.

If anything, Mayer said the emotional roller coaster of the disqualification and appeals process has only motivated him even more going into the ROVAL, because “it’s easy for people to count us out, and we thrive on that.”

Sam Mayer in action in 2023 at the Charlotte Motor Speedway ROVAL. (James Gilbert/Getty Images for NASCAR photo)

“No matter how the appeal turned out, my mindset was and is that I’m going to give it my all this weekend,” Mayer affirmed. “We have so much to prove and so much on the line. We never give up ever. I don’t care what situation you put this team in, we’re always going to fight to find ways to rise above, and I wouldn’t want to go into this with any other group of guys.

“People might look at the points situation – and the guys we’re racing against – and say that we don’t have much of a chance, but we’ve proved the doubters wrong before. That’s the goal again.”

Aside from A.J. Allmendinger – who is undefeated in Xfinity Series competition at the ROVAL – it’s difficult to find a driver better or more consistent on the layout than Mayer.

In addition to his pole-to-victory effort from last fall, he’s never finished worse than 11th in his three starts there and led 50 of the 67 laps a year ago.

Given that three of Mayer’s six Xfinity Series wins have come on road courses, it’s easy to piece together that it’s a discipline he enjoys, and the ROVAL is a track he considers “one of my favorites.”

“The ROVAL is special; it’s different and wild. It provides interesting racing because of how tight it is and how much variation there is in the layout,” Mayer explained. “Now with the new layout, it’ll be interesting because it’s even tighter in some spots and faster in others.

“We will all be learning on the fly, but it’ll be a good time for sure, especially with a win and playoff spots on the line.”

And as for pressure, don’t look to see any of that in Mayer’s face come Saturday either.

“We’re going to control what we can control,” he said. “If we do that, I believe we’ll have a real shot, and that’s all you can ask for as a driver.”

Broadcast coverage of the Drive for the Cure 250, the closing race in the Round of 12 of the Xfinity Series playoffs, is slated for Oct. 12 at 4 p.m. ET, live on The CW, the Performance Racing Network, and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, channel 90.