Sammy Smith Calls His Overtime Move On Taylor Gray 'Egregious'

Yahoo

30-03-2025

After the conclusion of Saturday's NASCAR Xfinity Series race at Martinsville Speedway, where Austin Hill was gifted his surprise second win of the season after an on-track altercation between Sammy Smith and Taylor Gray, the two were seen arguing outside of the care center. While Gray was tight-lipped about what the rivals had to say to one each other, Smith was not.
"It doesn't really matter, it kinda stays between us, that's why we had it without media around there," Gray told Toby Christie of Racing America. "It wasn't a very good conversation; it didn't really go anywhere. They never do. I just wanted to make sure that he knew I was frustrated and was not happy with him being dumped."
Smith told trackside media that Gray told him he wants to go at it.
"He says he wants to go at it, and we can go at it if he wants," Gray told NBC's Dustin Long. "But at the end of the day, it's probably going to be a lot more going forward, and that's okay with me."
In interviews with NASCAR's broadcast partner, The CW Sports, and other media post-race, Smith called his move on Gray egregious and said he wasn't proud of it, before backtracking to explain that he did it because he believed that Gray would've raced him the same way if given the chance.
"Absolutely, it was egregious," Smith said about his final move on Gray. "I'm not proud of it, but he would have done the exact same thing to me, roles reversed."
The problem with this line of thinking is that Gray had the chance to race Smith with the same level of unchecked aggression when he lined up in the second row behind him on the final restart.
The final stage of the Marine Corps 250 had 11 cautions, with Gray set up to lead the restart in five of the final six of those cautions. After the first three, where Smith lined up on the front row next to Gray, Smith started to choose the bottom behind Gray, hoping to follow the leader out past the outside front row and then take the lead.
He did this unsuccessfully twice, before on the third restart behind Gray, he succeeded in pushing Gray first to the lead by Allgaier and then out of the way. Gray wriggled but regained his position before Matt DiBennitto spun mid-pack, bringing out the overtime finish.
"We had good launches, and Sammy started choosing behind me and started to try and push me off the bottom," Gray told Sirius XM's Lee Spencer. "I was able to control it a little bit, but on the second-to-last restart, he did it hard enough so it finally got me off the bottom.
On the restart, Gray took the bottom line behind Smith and copied the Jr Motorsports drivers' modus operandi, getting him loose and taking the lead. A lap and a half later, Smith rammed Gray on the entry to the final corners, taking both of them out of contention for the win.
"I felt it was okay," Gray said on Smith's pre-overtime move. "I was a little upset at first, but I felt like it was somewhat okay because we were at Martinsville, coming to the end of the race. I did the same thing back to him, which I felt was fair, and he goes into three coming into the checkers and completely destroys me."
Smith says that he decided to race Gray the way he did at the end of the race due to a mixture of the two's checkered history and because Gray was flipping him off and swerving at his door while the field was under a red flag with 18 laps remaining.
"I'm not really proud of what I did," Gray told trackside media. "He just has no respect for me; he was flipping me off under the red flag and swerving at my door. I moved him into one, and he still had the lead on those two restarts. Going on the back straightaway, I thought to myself, what would he have done in this same situation, and he would've done the exact same thing. He was flipping me off, and that right there was the line for me to ultimately make the decision that I made."
The next two races on the docket for the Xfinity Series are Darlington next weekend, where tempers can run high, and then back to short-track racing at Bristol in two weeks. In a series where the fuses are shorter than the tracks, memories of those who robbed you of race wins run long.
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