Monster Energy Racing: Riley Herbst COTA NXS Advance

Riley Herbst Notes of Interest

•  Riley Herbst and the No. 98 Monster Energy team are ready to go deep in the heart of Texas during Saturday’s Pit Boss 250 at Circuit of the Americas (COTA) in Austin. The capital city plays host to NASCAR for a second straight year, with the Xfinity Series serving as the second race on the track’s triple-header bill, with the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series and NASCAR Cup Series also competing on the 3.426-mile, 20-turn road course. The outcome of this year’s race weekend will already be better than last year’s, as the forecast calls for sunshine and temperatures in the 80s. Rain and cool weather dampened last year’s inaugural race weekend at COTA, forcing drivers to tip-toe around the technical circuit.

•  In last year’s Pit Boss 250, Herbst overcame two spins to finish 16th. In fact, he started the 46-lap race in 29th after a wet qualifying session forced drivers to take a delicate approach to what ordinarily would be a smash-mouth ride around the track. Despite the low grid position, Herbst cracked the top-20 by just the fourth tour of the circuit and when another racecar stalled on the track, crew chief Richard Boswell quickly made the call to bring Herbst to pit road before the caution came out on lap 12. The savvy strategy propelled Herbst to finish 11th in the first stage, and it had him fifth for the start of the second stage. Unfortunately, a spin after contact with another car sent Herbst to the back of the pack for the remainder of the stage. After starting 23rd for the final stage, Herbst rallied to 13th before contact with another car on lap 43 spun him once more. Herbst drove aggressively in the waning laps, but time ran out and he had to settle for 16th.

•  Herbst has proven proficient at battling back, and this was on recent display last Saturday at Atlanta Motor Speedway. Herbst and the No. 98 Monster Energy team showed their speed and strength after going from two laps down to finish fourth at the 1.54-mile oval. Tire pressure issues sent the team to pit road just before the green flag. Despite having to start at the rear, Herbst worked his way up 13th by the conclusion of the first stage and into the top-10 just a few laps into the second stage. Rising water temperatures in the second stage forced the team to give up their top-10 spot to pit under green and check the engine. Herbst returned to the field two laps down in 38th. All was not lost, however, as Boswell employed a smart strategy to get Herbst back onto the lead lap with less than 50 laps remaining. After successfully avoiding a wreck with 10 laps to go, Herbst restarted in sixth, and as the race went into double overtime, Herbst earned his second top-five of the season.

•  Saturday’s race at COTA is the first of six road-course races for the Xfinity Series in 2022. Herbst comes into the Pit Boss 250 with 11 career road-course starts. He has finished among the top-10 three times with a best finish of seventh, earned twice – August 2020 on the Daytona (Fla.) International Speedway road course and July 2021 at Road America in Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin.

•  The Pit Boss 250 will mark Herbst’s 82nd career Xfinity Series start. His resume includes 11 top-fives and 37 top-10s. His best career finish is second, earned twice – February 2020 at Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, California, and July 2020 at Kentucky Speedway in Sparta.

Riley Herbst, Driver of the No. 98 Monster Energy Ford Mustang

You’re coming off a fourth-place finish last Saturday at Atlanta Motor Speedway – your second top-five of the season and your third top-10. Does that give you and the team some momentum as you go into a completely different discipline this weekend with a road-course race at COTA? 

“It boosts your confidence, for sure. In the back of your mind, though, you still know that this is a completely different style of racing, so you have to continue to put in the work. We struggled during the race last week, there’s no doubt about that. The No. 98 Monster Energy team is a top-five team every week, and while we made it there in the end, we made it pretty hard on ourselves. We’ll learn from that experience, though, and move on.”

What are your expectations for this weekend at COTA?

“I’m just looking forward to getting back down to Austin. It’s such a cool town. Even with the bad weather we had last year, they still packed that place with fans. Looking forward to seeing a good crowd cheer on all three series this weekend and just looking forward to getting back to road racing. It’s going to be so much fun. COTA is so difficult, but they did repave some of the sections so, hopefully, that gives us more grip in these big, heavy stock cars. We’ll be battling all 20 turns this weekend.”

TSC PR