'The better Mayer' has an unforgettable day at Road America ... well, mostly unforgettable
ELKHART LAKE – Sam Mayer can be forgiven if he was a little discombobulated.
He was still sweaty from the biggest victory of his racing career.
At his home track.
He’s 20.
And, let’s face it, there was nothing simple about the way Mayer won the Road America 180, a race that was excruciatingly straightforward save for one lap of all hell breaking loose Saturday.
“This is super special obviously,” the Franklin native said. “Moving away to North Carolina a couple of years ago to pursue this fulltime and winning back home is pretty special.”
Sam Mayer of Franklin has been knocking on the door in NASCAR
If you’ve been paying any attention to NASCAR or racers from Wisconsin the past couple of years, you have to know Mayer’s name.
His father, Scott, crashed out of three Indy Racing League starts 20 years ago and later ran 17 sports car races, including the Rolex 24 at Daytona. Sam grew up in karting, commuted to North Carolina to race Legends cars and hooked on with Chevrolet and JR Motorsports, the team co-owned by Dale Earnhardt Jr.
While waiting to turn 18 and move into the Xfinity Series in mid-2021, Mayer won two ARCA East titles, and he dabbled in NASCAR’s truck series, winning a race in 2020. He has shown enough promise to elude the stigma NASCAR fans might attach to someone backed by the employment agency his father started. Mayer has been in a fight on pit lane; he’s been on his lid at Daytona.
Going into Saturday, Mayer had top-10 finishes in more than half his 70 Xfinity Series starts, including 17 top-fives. Three times he had been runner-up, including a week earlier at Pocono Raceway in Pennsylvania.
“This proves we can do it and we can run for a championship and we’ve just got to put races together races coming up in the future like we did today,” Mayer said. “I had confidence the whole time. I was like, man, if I can win this one I can win just about anything.”
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The Road America 180 belonged to Justin Allgaier ... until it didn’t
A ragged race seemed to belong to Justin Allgaier, the 2018 Road America winner and a JR Motorsports teammate of Mayer’s. He led a whopping 42 laps and endured seven restarts after a competition caution, two stage breaks and yellow flags for stalls, spills and crashes.
Oil-drying compound was ultimately his undoing. NASCAR red-flagged the race after Connor Mosack’s car leaked fluid all around the course. The race, scheduled for 45 laps around the 4.048-mile, 14-turn course was already in overtime. The final green flew after 48.
When Allgaier slipped off Turn 6, Sage Karam and Mayer got by, fighting for the lead. But when Mayer went wide in 8, Karam got clear and Parker Kligerman grabbed second with the top three all fighting for their first victory.
“I knew (Karam) was going to be super aggressive because obviously he’s not fulltime, he’s coming here for trophies … so I knew the plan for him was going to be doing exactly what he did,” Mayer said when asked to explain what he saw and felt on a lap in which four drivers would lead. “I knew the door was going to be open; I just didn’t know when. It opened up in a really interesting spot in Turn 7.”
Four drivers swapped the lead five times during the second-last lap
Mayer made an outside run on Kligerman into the right-hand Turn 12. He couldn’t make it stick there but they were still in a race. When Karam shockingly went off in Turn 13, that became a race for the lead.
“Obviously you want to be in first place, right? But it’s probably the worst time to be in first place when you’re the first guy to go through the section with the most speedy dry,” Karam said. “You’re the guinea pig. I wasn’t even going through there full speed because I knew there was speedy dry there that was pretty heavy. Unfortunately when we hit it, it was just like hitting ice.”
That’s where Mayer got crossed up on the storytelling in all the delirium.
“I completely forgot about that,” he said.
In the moment, sure, but ultimately it’ll be a memory he holds dear.
“I know the door opened up,” Mayer continued. “(Kligerman) took advantage of that, and I took advantage of (him). … I knew that everyone in their right mind was going to do whatever they could to get it, and I was the first one to be able to take advantage of that and obviously lead the entire last lap.”
Kligerman said he too struggled with grip on the oil-drying dust.
“He went wide, I got him and I thought I got this. Just don’t blow 14,” Kligerman said. “And somehow Sam … I think he just sent it, found grip and found a lane while I tried to not blow the corner. I still slid out.
“He’s a good kid and he’s been at this for a while and to win up here, that’s big.”
Kligerman held onto second. 386 seconds back. Austin Hill finished third, the highest he’d run all day, and Karam ended up fourth. Allmendinger dropped to 18th after leading 42 laps.
Richfield native Josh Bilicki finished a career-best eighth, and Parker Retzlaff of Rhinelander crossed the line 14th.
Sam Mayer had been to Road America victory lanes before
While Saturday was Mayer’s first visit to NASCAR victory lane, he actually stood in the same spot in 2021 after winning a Trans Am TA2 race. The track has winners autograph a locker backstage, and Mayer found his and signed right next to it.
Mayer also was in the old victory lane hidden on the other side of the track, when his dad co-drove with Brendon Hartley to victory in a Grand-Am race. Video of that celebration played during the NBC broadcast.
Scott Mayer and his wife, Susanne, were watching in Turn 5 Saturday and even with the video screen didn’t instantly realize Sam had taken the lead. They made a quick dash to victory lane.
“This is way more amazing,” Scott Mayer said.
“Sam was so young then. He did the hat dance. I’d take the hat, wear it, take the picture, throw it to him. He had 10 stacked on his head. He had a great time as a kid. Fast forward to today, him winning is just so special and amazing. To do it at home is just a blessing. It’s beyond belief.”
That 2013 celebration was half Sam Mayer’s life ago.
“I don’t think I was conscious yet then,” he said when reminded. “I think I was still in my autopilot mode.
“It was super cool to be a part of that and …” wait for it … “then obviously winning it now to be the better Mayer.
“Oooooooooh.”
Yeah, he said it.
He was joking. Scott would never argue.
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Wisconsin's Sam Mayer earns first NASCAR Xfinity win at Road America
