NASCAR XFINITY SERIES: CHAMPIONSHIP

November 4, 2023

Justin Allgaier

Pit Lane Interview

Q. Walk us through that final restart, Justin, if you will. You were in good position with the other three.

JUSTIN ALLGAIER: Yeah, I mean, just first of all, hats off to this whole race team, everybody at JR Motorsports. To bring the Camaros we brought this weekend...

I don't know if I'll get another shot at it again next year. We at least will have a shot at it, but I don't know if we'll make it. But so proud of the effort of this team and what we were able to accomplish. The restart was fantastic. I thought we did everything right.

The 20 kind of missed the bottom and drove all the way up and honestly I was afraid I was going to run into the back of him. When I tried to turn back down the hill, it just was enough to let the 00 get back to my inside and ultimately getting down into Turn 3...

I don't know, I'm going to replay this one back in my head a couple times. I drove in there pretty deep and just kind of washed up.

The 00 had the turning car all night and we were just a little bit too free. Again, proud of our team, everybody at BRANDT to have the 70th anniversary and the platinum edition car here. To have all our partners this year. To have the season that we had, to finish third in the race and second in points, I can't be more thankful. Jim Pohlman, everybody on the 17, the pit stops, just really proud of the effort.

Obviously the 00 was as fast as Xfinity 10G. We weren't right there, but especially after trying to give it away on lap 2 or 3, still coming back through, what a night.

Proud of the effort, and we'll be back. We've got three months - two months until Daytona and we'll come back stronger and try to get to Victory Lane again.

Q. With JR Motorsports, they went to the effort to bring you the crew chief that you wanted to go forward in the future and then you had a chat with Junior afterwards. A lot to be thankful for including the effort, but how about that conversation with Junior?

JUSTIN ALLGAIER: I told him I'm happier this year with the effort and I'm not as sad leaving tonight. I can't give any more than I gave right there. That was all I had. We just came up short.

Like I said, last year I left here gutted, heartbroken, just miserable. I'm going to walk out of here tonight, I'm going to hold my head up high knowing that we gave it all we had. The sun is going to come up in the morning, and on Monday we're going to go back to work.

It was a big ask of us to do what we did in the off-season and to switch everything around. I couldn't be more proud of Jim Pohlman and the team that he's assembled here to even get us to this position. This is six times being in the Final 4. There's a lot to be said for that.

Yeah, I know he doesn't have a championship tied to it, but you've got to keep putting yourself in this position to go for a championship, and we've done that, and we'll try it again next year.