Historic arrival in NASCAR: he overtakes him on the last lap and precedes him by 2 thousandths, with an almost record-breaking “photo finish”

He Texas Speedwayone of the most traditional ovals in motorsports in the United States of Americalived this Saturday a day that will go down in history in nascar. Sam Mayer he staged a thrilling overtaking on the final lap and held on to victory by a few centimetres Ryan Siegin one of the closest goals of all time.

Mayer, in his black Chevrolet, was crushed against the outside wall after both cars collided side by side on the way to the checkered flag. The final difference was 0.002 secondsequaling the second closest final in series history.

The closest finish in NASCAR history occurred in 2018, when Tyler Reddick’s car won by 0.0004 seconds on that of his teammate, Elliott Sadler. The previous victory by 0.002 seconds was 25 years ago, at Talladega, with Terry Labonte celebrating against Joe Nemechek.

Behind them, Justin Allgaier He finished in third place after leading 117 of the race’s 200 laps.

Sieg had had a great race: he went from tenth place to first in a period of four laps, just before the final yellow flag of the race. After the restart, with 11 laps to go, the Tucker, Georgia, native remained in front until the final lap, when Mayer managed to place his No. 1 JR Motorsports car alongside him, Straight on the back.

Upon entering the final corner, Sieg returned his Ford to the inside of Mayer but remained behind and after observing the “photo finish” realized his dream of achieving his first victory in 342 races with the RSS team Racing, owned by his family. .

“The first emotion is definitely disappointment… we did it,” Sieg said of the race. “We took the lead but we were too close. I did everything I could. I changed line, I tried the brakes, I did everything. I was very close, I saw it coming. I did everything I could. In the end I was just trying to hit him against the wall to win the race. We were so close…” he lamented.

It was the fifth career victory for Mayer, and the first of this season, and perhaps the one in which he did the least credit in taking the first step of the podium: he dominated on only four different occasions, for a total of just five laps.

“It’s unreal. I mean, at one point I was a second and a half behind. So to make up that much time in such a short time is unreal,” Mayer said. And he added: “We led the most important lap… We are not absolutely dominant, but we gave our all to get to that point and win like that.”

In the rest of the locations, AJ Allmendinger was fourth, followed by Cole Custer, Austin Hill, Ryan Truex, Sammy Smith, Jesse Love AND Antonio Alfredo.

Although Allgaier dominated the race without taking the win, he finished in the top ten for the 266th time in his career, tying Kyle Busch’s record. The 37-year-old veteran driver completed his 446th race and has won 23 times.