Mayer Comes Home to Win Maiden NASCAR Xfinity Series Race at Road America.
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Two years ago, Sam Mayer moved to North Carolina to pursue a NASCAR career with JR Motorsports. The 20-year-old Franklin, Wisconsin native found it ironic that he had to come all the way back home and Elkhart Lake’s Road America to win his first NASCAR Xfinity Series race.
“Yeah, this is super special, obviously, being at home,” said Mayer. “Moving away to North Carolina a couple of years ago to pursue this full-time and winning all the way back home is super special.
“I’m super thankful for all the JR Motorsports guys that worked their tails off and it’s just special for more than just me. It’s special for all of them because this proves that we can do it, and we can run for a championship and we just got to put races together coming up in the future like we did today.
“I had confidence the whole time. I was thinking, man, if I could win this one, I can win just about anything. I’m super proud of myself, my team and everyone involved that made this happen because this got the monkey off our back, I think, for sure.”
But it wasn’t as easy as that.
For most of Saturday’s race, it was Mayer’s teammate, Justin Allgaier’s race to lose. Unfortunately for Allgaier, that’s just what happened.
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On lap 48, the next to last lap of overtime, the lead changed hands four times as Allgaier slipped exiting Turn 6, with Sage Karam getting by Allgaier entering Turn 7.
That allowed Mayer, running in third, to make it three wide and take the lead going into Turn 8, only to run wide and give the lead back to Karam as Allgaier spun off the track behind them.
“After we took the green, I knew the 24 (Karam) was going to be super aggressive because, obviously, he’s not full time, he’s coming here for trophies,” Mayer recalled. “I knew the plan for him was to do exactly what he did. I knew the door was going to be open at some time, I just didn’t know when. It opened up in an interesting spot in Turn 7."
As Mayer recovered and looked to get around the outside of Karam going into Turn 12, Parker Kligerman moved inside to move into second place.
Then Karam went off course at Turn 13 handing the lead to Kligerman.
Mayer then tapped the back of Kligerman’s car in Turn 14 and took the lead coming to the white flag.
“I know the door opened up and the 48 (Kligerman) took advantage of that, and I took advantage of the 48. That’s really what you got to do. Literally, the top four cars at that point were all racing for their first Xfinity win. I knew that everyone in their right mind would do whatever they could to get it and I was the first one to be able to take advantage of that and, obviously, lead the entire last lap.
“Obviously, at the end, we were really, really good for the last couple of laps, the second to last lap especially was hectic, going back and forth and back and forth, and ending on top, thank God.”
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Whether or not it was an omen, Mayer admitted to thinking about what it would mean to win Saturday’s race at Road America.
“At one point halfway through the race, I was like, if I could really do this with all the (NASCAR) Cup (Series) drivers in the field, even though we’re so far away from Richmond (Raceway), if we could do this and put a full race together today, I would be overcoming a lot because the 00 (Cole Custer) was really, really good, the 7 (Allgaier) was really good, the 10 (Allmendinger), all things considered, he had a really good car and he’s obviously really good, he’s proved that.
“I was like, if I can win and beat all these guys today with maybe not the best car in the field, but definitely a good car, I would be super happy with that. I didn’t think it was actually going to happen, but I just had that deep down confidence that it was.”
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When it came to celebrating his first career Xfinity Series win in his 71st start, Mayer conceded he’d forgotten what he was going to do.
“I think in all the scenarios in my head, oh man, I would do this, I would do that, and then, it actually being in front of you, you’re like, oh, crap, what was I going to do? But, it’s really cool to be able to pull it off and have it be almost a stress free last lap, just trying to put a full lap together.
“It’s super cool to have that happen, obviously, the fans and everyone in the stands and victory lane, they were congratulating me non-stop and chanting my name, stuff like that, you don’t see that very often, and to have that happen today, at home, it almost leaves you speechless.”