Truck, Xfinity Series races set stage for Homestead’s NASCAR playoff weekend. What to know
The headliner of this weekend’s races at Homestead-Miami Speedway is Sunday’s Dixie Vodka 400, the second of three Round of 8 races that will help determine the four drivers who will ultimately compete for the NASCAR Cup Series championship on Nov. 6.
But before the marquee event at Homestead-Miami Speedway, NASCAR’s other two series will have playoff races of their own on Saturday, each with different implications on the road to Phoenix Raceway in two weeks for their respective championship races.
The Camping World Truck Series race, the Baptist Health 200, is scheduled to start at 1 p.m. Saturday. That will be followed by the Xfinity Series’ Contender Boats 300, which is slated to start at 4:30 p.m.
Here’s what you need to know about each race.
Similar formats
The playoff structure for both the Truck Series and the Xfinity Series mirrors that of the NASCAR Cup Series.
At this stage, there are eight drivers in each series still competing to win a championship. There are three races in the Round of 8 stage. A driver from the group still eligible for the title automatically qualifies for the Championship Four with a win in any of these three races.
After that, the drivers at the top of the points standings will fill out the remaining slots.
Xfinity Series
Saturday’s Contender Boats 300 is the second of three races for the Xfinity Series’ Round of 8.
Josh Berry is already in the Xfinity Series’ Championship Four after winning the first Round of 8 race, the Alsco Uniforms 302 in Las Vegas last weekend.
Noah Gragson, Ty Gibbs and Justin Allgaier currently are the top three in the points standings, with Austin Hill, AJ Allmendinger, Brandon Jones and Sam Mayer rounding out the field vying for spots to compete for the Xfinity Series’ championship.
Trevor Bayne, who was eliminated from playoff contention in the Round of 12, won the pole position for Saturday’s race after finishing with the fastest lap in Friday night’s qualifying round.
Gragson joins Bayne on the top line in the No. 2 position of the 38-driver field.
“This is one I want to win at the most,” Gragson said. “I feel like we’ve been pretty good here. Just nothing to show for it.”
Gibbs will start the race in position No. 3, Jones in No. 5, Mayer in No. 6, Hill in No. 10, Allmendinger in No. 13 and Allgaier in No. 20.
Truck Series
The Baptist Health 200 is the final Round of 8 race in the Truck Series, so the full championship field will be known after the 134-lap race ends Saturday afternoon.
Ty Majeski has already locked in his spot in the Championship Four after winning the UNOH 200 at Bristol on Sept. 15, the first of three Round of 8 races.
The other seven drivers trying to make their way into the Championship Four, in order of their playoff standings heading into Saturday’s race: Chandler Smith, Zane Smith, Ben Rhodes, Christian Eckes, Stewart Friesen, John H. Nemechek and Grant Enfinger.
Chandler Smith and Zane Smith have a relatively large cushion on the rest of the field in the standings. Rhodes, the defending Truck Series champion, is just three points ahead of both Eckes and Friesen and five points ahead of Nemechek for the fourth and final spot to compete for the championship entering Saturday. Enfinger enters the race in eighth and 29 points behind Rhodes.
The Truck Series’ qualifying session on Friday was canceled nearly an hour after the session was slated to start because of rain shortly after the practice session, so Ryan Preece gets the pole position for Saturday’s race as determined by NASCAR’s rule book metric that factors in a combination of season points, finish in the previous race and fastest lap in the previous race.
Rhodes will have the top starting position among those in the playoff field, joining Preece on the top row in the No. 2 position of the 36-driver field.
The rest of the starting positions for the drivers competing for playoff spots: Chandler Smith is fourth, Eckes is fifth, Zane Smith is sixth, Friesen is ninth, Nemechek is 13th and Enfinger is 23rd.
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