Dale’s duo dominates Darlington: Allgaier wins, Gragson ties for No. 1 seed
DARLINGTON, S.C. — JR Motorsports dominated Saturday’s Mahindra ROXOR 200 at Darlington Raceway as Noah Gragson swept both stages but Justin Allgaier won.
Justin Allgaier led the most laps – 76 – and earned five playoff points for his first win of the 2022 season. Allgaier took the lead from A.J. Allmendinger with two laps to go and pulled away to snap a 34-race winless streak, dating back to last year’s May race at Darlington.
Allgaier was set to start third but the team had to change a battery right after the command, which put him in the rear to start the race. He drove from 38th to fourth in the first 45-lap stage and then finished third in the second 45-lap stage before claiming victory in the 147-lap race.
Allgaier tied teammate Gragson for the most regular-season points earned — 55 — of any driver in Saturday’s race.
Gragson finished second after leading 45 of 147 laps and winning stages one and two. Gragson is now tied with Ty Gibbs for the No. 1 NXS playoff seed after earning two playoff points for the stage wins and moving up to second in the regular-season points, 25 behind POINTS leader A.J. Allmendinger.
Allmendinger finished eighth overall after finishing sixth and eighth in stages one and two.
Riley Herbst moved to eighth in the regular-season points after finishing third overall – and fifth and tenth in the stages.
Herbst has five straight top-10 finishes, which is his longest streak since 2020 when he earned a career-high six straight top-10 finishes from the Aug. Daytona road course race to the Sept. Richmond race.
The playoff points and seeding in the table below are determined by what it would look like if the regular season ended today.
| Position | Driver | Playoff Points Total | Base Points | Points Position/Points | Points for Race Wins (5 Pts/Win) | Stage Wins (1 Pt/Win) |
| 1 | Ty Gibbs | 2025 | 2000 | 8 (3rd) | 15 (Las Vegas, Atlanta, Richmond) | 2 (Richmond – Stage 2, Martinsville Stage 1) |
| 2 | Noah Gragson | 2025 | 2000 | 10 (2nd) | 10 (Talladega, Phoenix) | 5 (Darlington – Stages 1 and 2, Las Vegas – Stages 1 and 2, Phoenix – Stage 2) |
| 3 | A.J. Allmendinger | 2022 | 2000 | 15 (1st) | 5 (COTA) | 2 (Atlanta – Stage 2, COTA – Stage 1) |
| 4 | Justin Allgaier | 2014 | 2000 | 7 (4th) | 5 (Darlington I) | 2 (Dover — Stage 2, Talladega – Stage 2) |
| 5 | Josh Berry | 2013 | 2000 | 6 (5th) | 5 (Dover) | 2 (Talladega – Stage 1, Atlanta – Stage 1) |
| 6 | Brandon Jones | 2011 | 2000 | 5 (6th) | 5 (Martinsville) | 1 (Martinsville – Stage 2) |
| 7 | Austin Hill | 2006 | 2000 | 1 (10th) | 5 (Daytona) | |
| 8 | Sam Mayer | 2006 | 2000 | 4 (7th) | 2 (Dover — Stage 1, COTA – Stage 2) | |
| 9 | Riley Herbst | 2003 | 2000 | 3 (8th) | ||
| 10 | Ryan Sieg | 2002 | 2000 | 2 (9th) | ||
| 11 | Daniel Hemric | 2002 | 2000 | (12th) | 2 (Daytona – Stages 1 and 2) | |
| 12 | Landon Cassill | 2000 | 2000 | (11th) |
| Regular Season Points Position | Driver | Points | Pts Behind Leader | Pts Behind (-)/Ahead (+) for a playoff spot or # of Wins |
| 1 | A.J. Allmendinger | 464 | 1 win | |
| 2 | Noah Gragson | 439 | -25 | 2 wins |
| 3 | Ty Gibbs | 423 | -41 | 3 wins |
| 4 | Justin Allgaier | 372 | -92 | 1 win |
| 5 | Josh Berry | 371 | -93 | 1 win |
| 6 | Brandon Jones | 347 | -117 | 1 win |
| 7 | Sam Mayer | 333 | -131 | (+69) |
| 8 | Riley Herbst | 318 | -146 | (+54) |
| 9 | Ryan Sieg | 317 | -147 | (+53) |
| 10 | Austin Hill | 301 | -163 | (+37) |
| 11 | Landon Cassill | 299 | -165 | (+35) |
| 12 | Daniel Hemric | 287 | -177 | (+23) |
| 13 | Anthony Alfredo | 264 | -200 | (-23) |
| 14 | Jeb Burton | 224 | -240 | (-63) |
| 15 | Sheldon Creed | 218 | -246 | (-69) |
| 16 | Brett Moffitt | 215 | -249 | (-72) |
| 17 | Brandon Brown | 206 | -258 | (-81) |
| 18 | Alex Labbe | 182 | -282 | (-105) |
| 19 | Jeremy Clements | 159 | -305 | (-128) |
| 20 | Myatt Snider | 144 | -320 | (-143) |
Bubble drivers Jeb Burton, Sheldon Creed, Brandon Brown, Jeremy Clements and Myatt Snider ran into issues during the race.
Burton was held one lap early for intentionally spinning in turn four on Lap 21. He eventually took the wave around and finished 15th but failed to earn any stage points and went from 58 to 63 points out of a playoff spot.
Sheldon Creed also found issues early as he had engine issues that took him out of the race on Lap 16. Creed’s car went up in smoke on a Lap 15 restart following a caution where his team investigated the issues. The engine failure set him back to 69 points behind a playoff spot after entering the race 42 behind.
Brandon Brown ran inside the top 15 until Lap 89 when he stalled on the frontstretch with an oil pump belt issue. Brown’s team repaired the belt but he fell multiple laps down and didn’t recover, as he finished 35th, five laps down. He is now 81 points behind a playoff spot after entering the race 55 behind.
Myatt Snider fell from 116 points out of a playoff spot to 143 after a wreck in turn 3. Snider has only two top-20 finishes in 11 races so far.
Jeremy Clements was headed toward a top-10 finish and the best points day of any bubble driver until a final-lap wreck knocked him back to a 29th-place finish. Clements did not earn any stage points and dropped from 108 points behind a playoff spot to 128.
The next race for the NASCAR Xfinity Series is the May 21 SRS Distribution 250 at Texas Motor Speedway (1:30 p.m. ET; TV: FS1; Radio: PRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
Last year, the first Texas NXS race was held in July and Austin Cindric was the only series regular to earn any playoff points. Cindric earned one playoff point for winning stage one while Kyle Busch won stage two and the overall race.
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