XFINITY: Sonoma splits the rear-end housing on Jesse Love’s Chevrolet

by Brock Beard / LASTCAR.info Editor-in-Chief

Jesse Love picked up the 1st last-place finish of his NASCAR XFINITY Series career in Saturday’s Pit Boss / FoodMaxx 250 at the Sonoma Raceway when his #2 Whelen Chevrolet fell out with rear gear issues after 11 of 79 laps.

The finish came in Love’s 52nd series start. In the XFINITY Series’ last-place rankings, it was the 5th for the #2, the 20th for rear gear issues, and the 666th for Chevrolet. Across NASCAR’s top three series, it was the 41st for the #2, the 54th for the rear gear, and the 1,999th for Chevrolet.

Entering just his second full-time season in the NASCAR XFINITY Series after winning half the 2023 ARCA Menards Series schedule on his way to the championship, the 20-year-old driver has already turned heads at Richard Childress Racing. Last season, he immediately matched the superspeedway prowess of teammate Austin (E.) Hill, winning the first two poles of the year at Daytona and Atlanta, then his first race in a particularly physical run at Talladega. This year, he won the season opener in Daytona, then took the checkered flag first for the series’ return to Rockingham, only to be disqualified for a technical infraction (but avoided last place since Justin Bonsignore was also disqualified with a worse finish). He entered Sonoma, about 80 miles north of his hometown of Menlo Park, looking to improve on a 12th-place showing in the 2024 running.

For Sonoma, Love carried a black-and-blue variant of his traditional red-and-white Whelen paint scheme. The hood and lower quarter-panels of his car carried the logo for the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund along with a “Move Over – It’s The Law” message on the TV panel. The car showed some impressive speed, ranking 2nd in practice behind only Connor Zilisch with a best lap of 75.896 seconds (94.392mph). This carried over into qualifying, where he secured 4th on the grid with a slightly faster lap of 75.839 seconds (94.463mph).

*Brad Perez’ No. 45 last on the grid for Saturday’s race.*

With 39 drivers entered for 38 spots, the battle for the final spot on the grid came down to Trans-Am driver Austin J. Hill – no relation to the RCR driver – seeking his NASCAR debut in the #35 AH Motorsports Chevrolet, and Brad Perez in the #45 Pala Casino Chevrolet. In practice, Hill ranked 36th, just ahead of Perez in 37th. Incredibly, Perez drove the same Chevrolet he ran last week in Chicago, where he managed to finish 30th despite a slide into the tire barriers at Turn 4. Perez and the Alpha Prime Racing team made repairs to chassis MWR 053, loaded the car Tuesday night, and brought it back west in time for practice on Friday:

“So, going into Chicago, I knew that we were gonna have to back-to-back this car, which is why, when I hit the wall, the first thing I thought of was 'Tommy Joe (Martins) is going to kill me.' I made a mistake on a downshift that was, like an actual, literal, personal mistake and put in the wall. Luckily, it wasn't that bad. It was like left-side rocker, all left side cosmetic, pushed like the bumper bars over in the back. So, we cut all those, sent it to Showalter in the morning on Monday. Showalter got it back to us Tuesday morning, like lunchtime. And they thrashed, I mean, from Tuesday lunchtime all the way to 11 o'clock at night. I was there with them, and we even got to run it around the neighborhood a little bit to make sure that it was going to go to the gears and all that. And it was fine. Obviously, there's no way for me to know that the alternator was going to take a crap (laughs). I had no idea that was going to happen. Hard to know at low RPM, but I'm just so happy.”

The quick turnaround was all the more impressive since, as Perez pointed out, the team also had to change the transmission, clutch, and flywheel, which were also damaged during the race in Chicago.

But the job still wasn’t done. When Perez attempted to pull onto the track for qualifying, the car’s dashboard shut off at the exit of pit road. NASCAR officials allowed them to coast back to pit road, where they changed the battery. By then, Hill had run multiple laps, which meant Perez could have been the lone DNQ if he didn’t put up a time. Perez did return to the track and made three laps, the best of which at 78.566 seconds (91.184mph) to Hill’s 78.672 seconds (91.062mph). Perez made the race by just 0.106 second.

“We had a battery problem - that's really an alternator problem that killed the battery. And I did not know what to do, like I was trying to get out of the way and not ruin qualifying. But luckily, we got it back there. And Eric Peterson - shout out, Eric Peterson of XFINITY, the series director - he allowed us to push the car back, change the battery, got it on there. Obviously, the alternator still doesn't work, but we let the battery run basically for one lap on 12 volts and made the race. We're underpowered, still made it. I am just so happy that the team did that. I mean, they hustled. We were not great, but we hustled and made the car better. Hopefully we're better for tomorrow.”

Perez also had a message for Austin J. Hill, whose team loaded up that afternoon.

“Sorry to Austin J. Hill. This was just his first race. I understand - I missed my first ever race in XFINITY. So hopefully he keeps his keeps his head up, man, it's not easy. I mean, these guys are like, some of the best you'll ever face. That's the hardest I've ever raced for 28th my entire life, is in the XFINITY series, and hopefully he comes back stronger, and gets to race with us.”

Perez incurred a redundant tail-end penalty for unapproved adjustments along with 36th-place Will Rodgers in the #70 Refology / Sipeos Chevrolet. Also docked was Taylor Gray, whose #54 Operation 300 Toyota had to surrender 11th on the grid to an engine change. Their car was still going through inspection late Friday afternoon.

When the green flag dropped, Gray had taken last from Perez, who was now several spots ahead. The next three cars in line belonged to 30th-place qualifier Jeremy Clements in the #51 Alliance / All South Electric Chevrolet, Rodgers’ #70, and the #28 Lynch Truck Center Ford of Kyle Sieg. Coming around to complete the first lap, the order had shuffled with Clements up 34th and Sieg in 35th alongside Daniel Dye’s #10 Champion Container Chevrolet. Sieg and Dye blocked the track for another side-by-side battle for last place where Gray ran to the inside of Austin Green’s #32 3Dimensional.com Chevrolet.

*Gray (No. 54) and Green (No. 32) in a battle for last at the end of Lap 1.*

By Lap 3, Sieg dropped to last place with Gray still stuck in 37th. On Lap 4, Gray had dropped Clements back to 37th, and Green ran wide in Turn 11 to keep ahead of Gray in 36th. By then, both were catching 35th-place Dean Thompson in the #26 Thompson Pipe Group Toyota, which suffered damage to the left-front fender near the headlight. On Lap 5, Sieg remained last, but was tracking down Clements, who was just over a carlength in front. Perez was also losing spots, running wide off Turn 11 to let Green by. By Lap 6, Perez had dropped back to 37th, now in the sights of Sieg, and Sieg dropped Perez to last on Lap 7. In between, Blaine Perkins completely missed Turn 11 and nearly struck the outside wall in his #31 Warrior Health Foundation Chevrolet.

On Lap 8, as Perez again caught Sieg, Christian Eckes was first to come down pit road – his stop for a flat tire that had shredded by the time he pitted his #16 LeafFilter Gutter Protection Chevrolet. Eckes managed to stay on the lead lap, though about 13 seconds of the simmering lead battle between front row starters Shane van Gisbergen and Connor Zilisch. This handed Eckes last place just as Perez was now battling Kris Wright, whose #5 First National Bank Corporation Chevrolet was also struggling with Turn 11. On Lap 11, Perez cleared Wright for the 36th spot with Eckes still some distance behind in last place. On Lap 12, Perez, Wright, and Sieg were nearly nose-to-tail still well ahead of Eckes.

*The battle intensifies among Clements, Perez, and Kyle Sieg.*

On that same Lap 12, Jesse Love became the second driver to make an unscheduled stop. Again, there was no visible damage, but reports indicated a growing issue with how aggressively he was hitting the curbs, then issues with the rear suspension. On Lap 13, PRN’s radio channel indicated Love had broken the rear end housing, which would put him out of the race. He still made it quickly to the garage, where the crew put the car on jackstands and removed the left-rear wheel. The crew worked for the next several laps, and Love looked both under the hood and under the left-rear, but by the end of Stage 1, they had been declared out of the race. The crew lowered the hood and attached the loading straps to the nose of the car. I spoke with Love as he headed to the team’s hauler shortly after his interview with TheCW:

“The rear-end housing split in half on the left side. (HAS THAT HAPPENED TO YOU BEFORE?) I've not. My crew chief (Danny Stockman, Jr.) hasn't in his 25 years of racing too. So definitely weird. Didn't have any big moments this weekend wheel-hop wise, didn't really run curbs that hard this weekend with a new repave. So very, very shocking for sure.”

*Love looks over his car with the team.*

Finishing 37th was Alex Labbe, whose #07 Sonoma Aviation Chevrolet finished 7th in Stage 1, then dropped to 37th with an extended stop of his own for issues with the rear suspension on Lap 38. He too pulled behind the wall, done for the afternoon, followed moments later by Sage Karam for a transmission failure on his #53 Eternal Fan Toyota, closing a difficult weekend for the Joey Gase Motorsports with Scott Osteen team. Ryan Sieg finished 10th in both stages, but his #39 Sci Aps Ford suffered right-front damage and lost three laps, putting him on the same lap as 34th-place Eckes. Eckes’ frustrating day took another turn when he stoved in the nose of his car in the middle stages, forcing extensive repairs on pit road. He still cleared the “Crash Clock” and finished under power.

Sawalich finally has his day; Green, Bilicki, and Rodgers also impress

The biggest surprise on Saturday wasn’t simply Connor Zilisch ending Shane Van Gisbergen’s road course winning streak – it was William Sawalich following-up his daring ARCA Menards Series West victory at Sonoma on Friday with a career race, taking 3rd in his #18 Soundgear Toyota for Joe Gibbs Racing. In his 22 career starts, this marks Sawalich’s first career top-five finish, his previous best a 6th in Mexico City. He’d failed to finish seven of the previous 18 races run this season, including the last two in a row, yielding finishes of 36th and 37th.

Further back, Austin Green clawed his way from his early last-place battle to take home 11th, returning to the site of his last-lap battle with Sam Mayer for 3rd in 2024. After beginning the year with three finishes of 26th or worse and a pair of DNQs, Green has since racked off three consecutive finishes of 11th or better, all on road an street courses.

Three spots behind came Josh Bilicki in a 14th-place effort for DGM Racing x JIM in the #91 SBC Contractors, Inc. Chevrolet. After a speeding penalty cost him a lap, he earned the Lucky Dog at the end of Stage 1 and more than made the most of it. Bilicki has now finished in the Top 20 in all three of his XFINITY Series starts at Sonoma, of which this is his track-best, joined by a 16th in 2024 and 19th in 2023.

And in 16th for the Cope Family Racing effort, Will Rodgers bounced back from his mechanical issue that spoiled his ARCA West race on Friday to take 16th at the checkered flag, his third-best finish in ten series starts and best overall since 2021.

LASTCAR STATISTICS

*This marked the first last-place finish for the #2 in a XFINITY Series race since May 7, 2022, when Sheldon Creed’s own turn in the #2 Whelen Chevrolet ended with a blown engine after 16 laps at Darlington.

*Love is the first driver to finish last in a XFINITY Series race with rear gear trouble since October 21, 2023, when Ryan Newman dropped out after 27 laps at Homestead.

THE BOTTOM FIVE

38) #2-Jesse Love / 11 laps / rear gear

37) #07-Alex Labbe / 36 laps / suspension

36) #53-Sage Karam / 40 laps / transmission

35) #39-Ryan Sieg / 76 laps / running

34) #16-Christian Eckes / 76 laps / running

2025 LASTCAR XFINITY SERIES OWNER'S CHAMPIONSHIP

1st) Kaulig Racing (5)

2nd) Joe Gibbs Racing (4)

3rd) Sam Hunt Racing (2)

4th) Alpha Prime Racing, Joey Gase Motorsports with Scott Osteen, JR Motorsports, Our Motorsports, Richard Childress Racing, RSS Racing, SS-Green Light Racing, Young’s Motorsports (1)

2025 LASTCAR XFINITY SERIES MANUFACTURER'S CHAMPIONSHIP

1st) Chevrolet (12)

2nd) Toyota (6)

3rd) Ford (1)

2025 LASTCAR XFINITY SERIES DRIVER'S CHAMPIONSHIP