(NEXSTAR) — It’s hard to believe that William Byron, a Charlotte native, came into Saturday’s Xfinity Series race having never won at his hometown track.
At one point Saturday, it looked like he was well on his way to a perfect race at the BetMGM 300 at Charlotte Motor Speedway, before a penalty put him way back in the pack.
But Byron showed just why he’s one of the best drivers in the sport, chasing down the reigning Xfinity Series champ Justin Allgaier to win in overtime, kickstarting his hometown return with his first of potentially two wins this weekend.
“I felt like it was a little bit of a hump I had to get over with coming back to Xfinity, and I feel like I’ve been close,” Byron said. “Today I was bummed because I felt like I had kind of given it away there with the speeding penalty, but luckily we got a lot of cautions there at the end and I was able to have a great restart on the last one.”
The rookie Connor Zilisch nearly snagged his second win of the season but ended things in second place.
Series leader Justin Allgaier finished fourth after worn tires caused him issues in overtime.
Byron kicked off the season strong with a win at one of NASCAR’s crown jewel races, the Daytona 500, and is looking to secure a win at Sunday’s Coca-Cola 600 for back-to-back wins this weekend.
“It’s a new day in the sense of the challenges that are ahead for sure,” Byron said. “So you have to lock in and think about what are the things that the Cup car needs to do, and how do we need to manage the whole event.”
As for the Xfinity Series, it heads down to Tennessee at Nashville Superspeedway next week for the Tennessee Lottery 250.
You can catch that race on The CW on May 31 at 7:30 p.m. ET.