By Matthew Thomerson/TheFourthTurn.com

HAMPTON, Ga. – Justin Allgaier avoided carnage and calamity on Saturday night in the Focused Health 250 at EchoPark Speedway to win his sixth race of the season.

Allgaier survived two overtime finishes Saturday and continues to lead the NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series in most of the statistical categories. On a night where it looked like an upset winner could prevail, the class of the field in Allgaier was there to continue making his mark on the season.

It’s his 34th-career win in the series, making him sixth all-time and four wins behind Carl Edwards for fifth. With the win, not only does Allgaier continue to increase his points lead, but he also secures the regular-season championship with still three races to go.

“So proud of everybody at Jr. Motorsports,” Allgaier said. “We had four, actually five, great Chevrolets today. I knew at the end there was going to be some guys close on fuel, you just never give up. Andrew Overstreet, this whole seven-team, Eddie D’Hondt spotter, they talk over and over again about not giving up, and that’s what this team is all about.”

As the final laps dwindled, Allgaier went from leading to being nearly involved in several wrecks, but he made it count when it was needed most. On the second overtime restart, Nick Sanchez and Brennan Poole cleared leader Carson Kvapil, with Allgaier trailing behind. Poole led at the white flag, but got into the wall along with Sanchez, allowing Allgaier to clear and fend off Kvapil and Parker Retzlaff to grab the victory.

In second, was the aforementioned Kvapil, who has produced another solid season between both JR Motorsports and DGM Racing cars. Kvapil led as the final restart ensued and got tag-teamed and passed by both Sanchez and Poole, and despite them both wrecking on the last lap, was unable to get by his teammate in the final corners.

“Obviously JR Motorsports brings fast cars,” Kvapil said. “Rodney Childers brings fast cars. It’s up to me to bring them to victory lane, and you finish second so many times it gets kind of annoying right. I don’t even really think it was something where we just got outraced at the end; it was just one of those deals where the seas parted, and it didn’t work out for us.”

In third, was Retzlaff, who was able to get by the cars wrecking on the last lap as well and had a chance at Allgaier going into Turn 3 but wasn’t able to capitalize. It’s still a solid result for the Viking Motorsports driver, getting his third top-10 in eight races at the Atlanta oval.

In fourth, was William Sawalich, and Anthony Alffedo rounded out the top-five. Garrett Smithley finished sixth, Brandon Jones seventh, Kyle Sieg eighth, Rajah Caruth ninth and Jeremy Clements rounded out the top-10 finishers.

Kvapil won Stage 1, and Allgaier won Stage 2.

Sammy Smith led a race high of 34 laps. There were 18 lead changes among 11 leaders.

There were 13 cautions for 76 laps, the most cautions ever for a NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series race at EchoPark Speedway.

Allgaier has now extended his points lead to 240 over reigning series champion Jesse Love.

The next race for the NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series is the Pennzoil 250 presented by Take 5 Oil Change at Indianapolis at Indianapolis Motor Speedway on Saturday, July 25. Live coverage will begin on the CW Network at 4 p.m. ET.

Photo Credit: Christian Koelle/TheFourthTurn.com