With his win in Saturday’s Contender Boats 250 at Homestead-Miami Speedway, Myatt Snider is now a NASCAR winner. In his second season of Xfinity Series competition and first full campaign with Richard Childress Racing, the beloved meme king held off RCR’s Cup Series driver and former Xfinity champion Tyler Reddick to become the king of Homestead and win his first national series race. Despite his runner-up finish, Reddick would not get to savour it as he was disqualified for failing post-race inspection.
Points leader Austin Cindric started on the pole ahead of Daniel Hemric, while Snider began the day in eleventh. Reddick and his #03 Our Motorsports car were locked out of the grid for the third straight race due to a lack of qualifying and owners’ points, but the two-time Xfinity champion and Homestead ace (having won twice in the Xfinity Series and finishing fourth in his first Cup race there) found a ride with RSS Racing‘s #23. Officially, the #23 remained part of RSS while the car was prepared by Our, like how the it was a Reaume Brothers Racing vehicle but still an RSS entry when Natalie Decker piloted it at last week’s Daytona road course race; the RBR and Our #23 were both Chevrolets while RSS’s main #39 of Ryan Sieg is a Ford.
Cindric led the first 30 laps before the first caution of the day came out for Stefan Parsons‘ spin. The Kaulig Racing trio of A.J. Allmendinger, Justin Haley, and Jeb Burton took advantage and occupied the top three for much of the opening stage’s remainder. While Allmendinger and Haley would finish the segment 1–2, Burton was overtaken by the Joe Gibbs Racing duo of Hemric and cousin Harrison Burton on the final lap. Justin Allgaier, Brandon Jones, Josh Berry, Michael Annett, and Noah Gragson rounded out the top ten.
Allmendinger dominated the second stage before a caution came out on lap 69 for fluid on the track. Setting up a six-lap dash to the green-checkered flag, Gragson briefly led before Cindric took the position and drove off to the stage win. Snider also passed Gragson for second, while Riley Herbst, Jones, Jeremy Clements, Sieg, Allmendinger, J. Burton, and Landon Cassill also recorded top tens. Cassill’s tenth marked the first stage points of the season for JD Motorsports, whom he rejoined for 2021.
The second stage began with Cindric continuing to lead even through a lap 99 caution for a wreck involving Allgaier and Herbst. A yellow flag on lap 111 for fluid would mark Cindric’s last time in front for the rest of the day as Jones, Allmendinger, and Brett Moffitt traded the position before Gragson took it on lap 137.
Gragson appeared poised to drive off to his first win since June 2020 at Bristol until his day came to an abrupt end with three laps to go: riding the high line, he ran into the back of David Starr, whose #13 had blown a tyre and climbed up into the wall in turn three. The incident resulted in overtime which Reddick led until Allmendinger spun after contact with Jones, resulting in a second overtime.
“You got dipshits in the way every single week,” Gragson said in an interview with FS1. “[…] Definitely a bummer. They know who won this race based off speed the last three times we’ve been here.”
Gragson later asserted on Twitter that Starr’s tyre had not gone down, writing he “*didn’t blow a tire*” in response to YouTuber Eric Estepp’s tweet about the matter.
Sebastian Laforge, a crewman for Starr’s MBM Motorsports team, tweeted a photo of the damage in the evening. Laforge had posted earlier that “if you cut a tire going into the corner, there isn’t much you can do. Sucks, but it’s a racing deal. When these cars are rim riding, you’re in the wall if anything happens.”
“Tire came apart,” he followed in another tweet. “Didn’t lose air, but the tread had came apart and he lost grip immediately into the corner. Dudeman was even running a lower line than normal to allow Noah to pass in that corner.”
Snider took the lead and held off Reddick to claim his first victory in the national series. The victory is the second by a first-time Xfinity winner after Ty Gibbs won in his series début on the road course, and the fourth overall across seven total races after Michael McDowell and Christopher Bell at the Cup level. Incidentally, Gibbs and Snider’s victories marked the first time since Alex Bowman and Bell in 2017 that drivers scored their maiden Xfinity victories in consecutive races.
The 26-year-old joins a small company of drivers who have won a national series race and competed in the NASCAR Whelen Euro Series; Snider finished sixth in the Elite 2 (now EuroNASCAR 2) championship in 2019 with two podiums. NASCAR Hall of Famer Bobby Labonte competed in the series’ Elite 1 Division (now EuroNASCAR Pro) from 2017 to 2019, while NASCAR’s Vice President of Racing Development Ben Kennedy has victories on both sides of the Atlantic. Five-time Camping World Truck Series winner Rick Crawford ran two Euro Series races in 2013.
Snider posted on Twitter, “OFFICIALLY Xfinity series winners!!!!! I can’t believe it y’all! I don’t even know what to say We #SlayedIt!”
In post-race inspection, Reddick’s car failed on the rear heights and he was disqualified, relegating him to last. Jones was bumped up to second while Berry moved to tenth for his first Xfinity top ten since Iowa in 2016. Reddick is the first driver in 2021 to suffer a disqualification, and the first since Annett at last season’s fall Talladega race. The 2020 Xfinity season saw three disqualifications in total, one of which took away a victory from Kyle Busch.
Jade Buford, who began his NASCAR career as a road course ringer, finished twentieth in his maiden oval race. IndyCar regular Santino Ferrucci ended his NASCAR début in thirtieth.
Race results
| Finish | Start | Number | Driver | Team | Manufacturer | Laps | Status |
| 1 | 10 | 2 | Myatt Snider | Richard Childress Racing | Chevrolet | 179 | Running |
| 2 | 4 | 19 | Brandon Jones | Joe Gibbs Racing | Toyota | 179 | Running |
| 3 | 2 | 18 | Daniel Hemric | Joe Gibbs Racing | Toyota | 179 | Running |
| 4 | 5 | 10 | Jeb Burton | Kaulig Racing | Chevrolet | 179 | Running |
| 5 | 1 | 22 | Austin Cindric | Team Penske | Ford | 179 | Running |
| 6 | 8 | 11 | Justin Haley | Kaulig Racing | Chevrolet | 179 | Running |
| 7 | 6 | 02 | Brett Moffitt* | Our Motorsports | Chevrolet | 179 | Running |
| 8 | 22 | 39 | Ryan Sieg | RSS Racing | Ford | 179 | Running |
| 9 | 9 | 51 | Jeremy Clements | Jeremy Clements Racing | Chevrolet | 179 | Running |
| 10 | 20 | 8 | Josh Berry | JR Motorsports | Chevrolet | 179 | Running |
| 11 | 29 | 98 | Riley Herbst | Stewart-Haas Racing | Ford | 179 | Running |
| 12 | 39 | 17 | J.J. Yeley | SS-Green Light Racing | Chevrolet | 179 | Running |
| 13 | 18 | 1 | Michael Annett | JR Motorsports | Chevrolet | 179 | Running |
| 14 | 24 | 16 | A.J. Allmendinger | Kaulig Racing | Chevrolet | 179 | Running |
| 15 | 25 | 36 | Alex Labbé | DGM Racing | Chevrolet | 179 | Running |
| 16 | 33 | 66 | Timmy Hill | MBM Motorsports | Ford | 179 | Running |
| 17 | 32 | 90 | Dexter Bean | DGM Racing | Chevrolet | 179 | Running |
| 18 | 27 | 44 | Tommy Joe Martins | Martins Motorsports | Chevrolet | 179 | Running |
| 19 | 11 | 4 | Landon Cassill | JD Motorsports | Chevrolet | 179 | Running |
| 20 | 31 | 48 | Jade Buford | Big Machine Racing | Chevrolet | 179 | Running |
| 21 | 40 | 13 | David Starr | MBM Motorsports | Ford | 179 | Running |
| 22 | 36 | 0 | Jeffrey Earnhardt | JD Motorsports | Chevrolet | 179 | Running |
| 23 | 37 | 61 | Chad Finchum | MBM Motorsports | Toyota | 179 | Running |
| 24 | 35 | 6 | Ryan Vargas | JD Motorsports | Chevrolet | 179 | Running |
| 25 | 12 | 47 | Kyle Weatherman | Mike Harmon Racing | Chevrolet | 179 | Running |
| 26 | 15 | 92 | Josh Williams | DGM Racing | Chevrolet | 178 | Running |
| 27 | 16 | 07 | Joe Graf Jr. | SS-Green Light Racing | Chevrolet | 178 | Running |
| 28 | 26 | 52 | Gray Gaulding | Jimmy Means Racing | Chevrolet | 178 | Running |
| 29 | 17 | 5 | Matt Mills | B.J. McLeod Motorsports | Chevrolet | 178 | Running |
| 30 | 21 | 26 | Santino Ferrucci | Sam Hunt Racing | Toyota | 177 | Running |
| 31 | 30 | 99 | Stefan Parsons | B.J. McLeod Motorsports | Toyota | 177 | Running |
| 32 | 14 | 78 | Jesse Little | B.J. McLeod Motorsports | Toyota | 177 | Running |
| 33 | 23 | 9 | Noah Gragson | JR Motorsports | Chevrolet | 165 | Accident |
| 34 | 7 | 68 | Brandon Brown | Brandonbilt Motorsports | Chevrolet | 152 | Overheating |
| 35 | 34 | 74 | Bayley Currey | Mike Harmon Racing | Chevrolet | 148 | Power |
| 36 | 28 | 15 | Colby Howard | JD Motorsports | Chevrolet | 109 | Rear Gear |
| 37 | 13 | 54 | Ty Dillon | Joe Gibbs Racing | Toyota | 102 | Radiator |
| 38 | 19 | 7 | Justin Allgaier | JR Motorsports | Chevrolet | 98 | Accident |
| 39 | 3 | 20 | Harrison Burton | Joe Gibbs Racing | Toyota | 70 | Engine |
| 40 | 38 | 23 | Tyler Reddick* | RSS Racing | Chevrolet | 179 | Running (DSQ) |
* – Ineligible for Xfinity points
