What would you do for a win as a racecar driver? Daniel Hemric has had literal years to ponder over that question since he broke into NASCAR’s top three series. Since making his debut in the Trucks Series back in 2013, Hemric in just over 200 career starts had never won a race in any of the three series. Not because Hemric is a subpar driver, quite the contrary. Entering Saturday night, he had a 60 percent Top 10 finish clip in the Xfinity Series. On top of a 37 percent Top 5 finish clip as well. Hemric, however, struggled with sealing the deal, well until now.
In a summary before overtime, Hemric had been running well in the Championship Race. Austin Cindric had the Final Four covered for a wide majority of the night, however. For the other two contenders, Noah Gragson was good, but a hero ball move late going into turn one took him out of things. As for the favorite AJ Allmendinger, he just never had things going on Saturday. He had some handling issues early, then spun late due to a loose wheel.
After a few more cautions, we hit overtime, with Cindric and Hemric set to duke it out. Hemric, who has had to hear about his lack of a win for years now took things into his own hands. Going into the last turn of the final race of the year, Hemric did what he had to do. Getting into Cindric out of turn four, then beating him to the finish line by a matter of feet to win the Xfinity Series Championship.
A FINISH FOR THE AGES!
DANIEL HEMRIC WINS THE CHAMPIONSHIP! pic.twitter.com/3Th1benCnC
— NASCAR Xfinity (@NASCAR_Xfinity) November 7, 2021
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Checkers or Wreckers
Like or not, this is why NASCAR has the current postseason format they do, for finishes just like this. Getting into Cindric was Hemric’s only shot at winning the race and Championship and he executed it about as well as he could. A wise man in a certain 90s racing movie said the following. “He rubbed you, and rubbin’ son, is racing.”
That is exactly what Hemric did here. He absolutely could have junked Cindric but didn’t, and the driver of the No. 22 took the situation well all things considered. It’s not the way Cindric would have wanted to end out his Xfinity Series career, but he has a very bright future in front of him. Expect good things from him in the No. 2 car in Cup next year.
He had a dominant car, but in the end, @AustinCindric came up one position short. pic.twitter.com/mMBs9kDPnv
— NASCAR Xfinity (@NASCAR_Xfinity) November 7, 2021
We Live in a Simulation
Credit to Elijah Burke, who runs the Social Media and Digital departments at Roush-Fenway for pointing this insane fact out. As longtime NASCAR fans know, the great Carl Edwards would always do backflips off of the top of his car after a race win. As it was pointed out on the NBCSN broadcast, Hemric does this as well. Only he has not had the chance to pull one off for quite some time. Just wait this gets even crazier.
Edwards’ final win as a NASCAR Cup Series driver was the sixth of November in 2016. Saturday night’s date, the sixth of November. Martin Scorsese and Christopher Nolan couldn’t even script this stuff any better, but wait there is more. Edwards won his final race with Joe Gibbs Racing and crew chief Dave Rogers. Hemric won on Friday with Joe Gibbs Racing with Rogers atop the pit box.
Unlike Edwards, Hemric had something else to deal with for this weekend. Typically to race in a NASCAR sanctioned event, you need a car. Up until about a half-hour before the lone practice session, his No. 18 car was AWOL. It appeared that a wild deer forced the team’s hauler to make evasive maneuvers on route to Phoenix. Luckily the car did make it to the track in the nick of time, which just adds to the story of this Championship win.
Bittersweet Victory
If there is any bit of sad news out of this Championship win, is that it was Hemric’s final race with Gibbs. It has been known for some time that he is making the jump to Kaulig Racing for 2022. This is set to be the fourth new team in as many years for him, but Kaulig is by no stretch a downgrade. Teaming up with Allmendinger will almost certainly be a fun storyline to watch next season.
On the other side of things, Hemric deserves to be in this spot. To go winless in NASCAR for the amount of time he did had to be disheartening. He also got booted from a Cup Series ride after just one year which felt very premature all things considered. Then after a part-time gig at JR Motorsports, he got the chance to go full-time racing with Gibbs and he made the absolute most of it. Saturday is a date Hemric should cherish for the rest of his life. He had to go through a lot to get here from a career standpoint and never gave up.
Hang it in the Louvre. pic.twitter.com/SlV0E6Gcl4
— NASCAR Xfinity (@NASCAR_Xfinity) November 7, 2021
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