KANSAS CITY, Mo. — It was perhaps the wildest ride of Anthony Alfredo’s life.
During a restart with 29 laps to go in the NASCAR Xfinity Series Kansas Lottery 300 last October at Kansas Speedway, Alfredo was dueling Chase Briscoe for the win.
After pit stops shuffled the pack, Briscoe and Alfredo restarted alongside one another in seventh and eighth, respectively.
“He had been leading the whole race and we really couldn’t get around,” Alfredo said. “We were running second or third to him all day, but I knew if we could get to the clean air before he did we could probably get the win.”
Instead, Alfredo was involved in a spectacular fiery crash, which left him sliding through Turns 1 and 2 at Kansas Speedway on his roof.
Alfredo drove down to the apron off the restart, hoping to nudge ahead of Briscoe.
Alfredo found himself sandwiched between Justin Allgaier to the inside and Brandon Brown to the outside.
As Turn 1 approached, Allgaier came up the apron, clipping Alfredo’s left rear bumper and sending the No. 21 Andy’s Frozen Custard Chevrolet up the track nose first into the wall.
Unable to avoid the carnage, Riley Herbst T-boned Alfredo’s car, sending it on its side and eventually onto its roof as it skidded across the track in a hail of fire and sparks.
It took safety crews, who confirmed that Alfredo wasn’t seriously injured, nearly 3 1/2 minutes to flip the car back onto its wheels so he could unstrap and exit through the window.
“It was definitely a pretty wild ride, but it could have been worse,” Alfredo said. “I’m just glad I didn’t catch on fire while being upside down or anything like that. Being upside down doesn’t feel good in the first place, but it would be really hard to get out in that situation.”
The race was red-flagged for several laps before Alfredo emerged from the car and thrust his hands in the air, letting the crowd know he was OK.
Reflecting on the race, Alfredo said he’s disappointed, because “honestly, I just remember having a shot to win that race,” and hopes he’s never in a wreck that bad again.
“It was definitely not the ideal way to go through turns one and two, but I still love Kansas Speedway,” Alfredo said. “It’s a fun track, and I’m still excited to go back there nonetheless.”
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Alfredo, a 22-year-old native of Connecticut, jumped to the NASCAR Cup Series in 2021 as the driver of Furniture Row Motorsports’ No. 38 team.
He returned to Kansas Speedway in May for the Buschy McBush 400, finishing 23rd on the 1.5-mile tri-oval where he’d been battered and bruised only seven months earlier.
“I went back to Kansas earlier this year for the spring race in the Cup car and had a great showing,” he said. “We had a loose wheel on pit road at the end that forced us to finish worse than we should have. But I went there, we had a successful race and I’m excited to go back. I got that first one back out of the way and didn’t have any problems after that race or going back to that same track.”
Ironically, Alfredo was involved in another fiery crash last Sunday at Texas Motorspeedway.
The Cup Series returns to Kansas Speedway for the Hollywood Casino 400 at 2 p.m. on Sunday.
The track also will host two races on Saturday, the Xfinity Series Kansas Lottery 300 at 2 p.m. and the ARCA Menards Series Reese’s 150, which will decide the series championship, at 6 p.m.
