Spencer Gallagher and the No. 23 Allegiant team unloaded on Friday for their first time at Homestead-Miami Speedway and for the final race of the 2017 season. Wanting to finish out the season strong, the No. 23 team worked hard all weekend to prepare the Allegiant Chevy for Saturday afternoon’s NASCAR XFINITY Series 300, finishing 12th in first practice, 18th in final and claiming a 28th-place starting position for the 200-lap finale.
Gallagher reported early on to the No. 23 team that he was experiencing loose into the corner and throttle tight on the exit conditions. When the first caution occurred on lap 19, crew chief Joey Cohen called Gallagher to pit road for four tires, fuel, a track-bar and wedge adjustments, restarting 28th on lap 23rd. With fresher tires than the majority of the field, Gallagher made his way into the 3rd position with 10 laps to go in Stage One and stayed in that position until the green-white checkered flag waved. Gallagher collected eight stage points en route to his highest stage finish of the season. Cohen called Gallagher to pit three other times throughout the event for four tires, fuel and adjustments. The Chevy’s handling started getting tighter as the sun set causing Gallagher to drop back into the 19th position where he settled in until ultimately crossing the start-finish line to end the 200-lap event and his first full-time NXS season.
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“This year hasn’t been easy by any means but we can say that we kept battling and never gave up. It was a learning year and we collected a lot of good info for our NXS program. I wish we could have gotten a top-10 to finish the season off strong but we will take a 19th-place finish and build on that.”
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