In his home race at Las Vegas Motor Speedway (LVMS), Spencer Gallagher, driver of the No. 23 Allegiant Travel Chevrolet, showed perseverance over the course of 146 laps to capture his 11th top-15 finish of his rookie campaign. Gallagher finished 15th after facing a consistently tight handling condition throughout the Rhino Linings 350.
For the second-consecutive week, the Las Vegas native advanced to the final round of qualifying, and earned a solid 10th-place starting position. From the drop of the green flag, Gallagher advanced to seventh place in the opening laps, narrowly avoiding the event’s first caution on lap 15. Gallagher came to pit road for right-side tires under the first yellow, and returned to pit road under the second caution at lap 38 for fuel only and a wedge adjustment to aid a tight handling condition.
From the lap 42 restart, Gallagher reported he had developed a “terrible tight” condition in the center and on corner exit, which forced him out of the top 10, and back to 15th position by lap 63. The race’s second-half was highlighted by long green flag runs, during which the field would make green flag pit stops. Gallagher came to the attention of his Allegiant Travel team on lap 92 after the extremely tight condition caused him to shred a right-front tire. Because of the flat tire, Gallagher was too close to the pit wall, and could only change right side tires. As a result, he revisited pit road on lap 128 to refuel and take left side tires.
Over the final 18 laps, Gallagher advanced his position from 17th to take the checkered flag in the 15th position. Following the Rhino Linings 350 at LVMS, Gallagher still resides in the top 10 in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series points, in 10th position, as the tour resumes action on October 24 at Talladega Superspeedway.
SPENCER GALLAGHER QUOTE:
“I always enjoy racing at home, but tonight, our Allegiant Travel Silverado was too tight to really make up time on a longer run. We had some decent short run speed, qualified well, but we just got really tight throughout the race. Even after we had to pit twice under green, we were still able to make it back to where we were running before that pit cycle. We had a great fan base here this weekend, and wished for a little different result, but our GMS Racing team kept tuning on this Chevrolet all night and still salvaged a top-15 finish. We’ll head to Talladega (Superspeedway) in a few weeks, and see if we can’t mix it up for the win there.”
GMS Racing PR
