William Sawalich led the final 79 laps of the North Carolina Education Lottery 250 at Rockingham Speedway on Saturday and secured his first career victory in the NASCAR O'Reilly Auto Parts Series. With the win, Joe Gibbs Racing ended JR Motorsports' streak of five consecutive victories and preserved its own record of six straight wins in the category, set in 2008.

Sawalich took the lead on a restart on lap 172 and no one could catch him. Brandon Jones, his teammate at JGR, finished second and Justin Allgaier third; both agreed that Sawalich's speed on restarts was impossible to match. "His short-run speed was very good, he launched really well," said Jones. "If you look at it as a graph, my car was getting better and his was getting worse on long runs, but he built such a big advantage at the start that it was hard to get back to him."

"It was a tough year in 2025 and a tough start this year," said Sawalich, who moved up three positions in the overall standings to 11th. "Our Supra was incredible. I was fifth in Stage 1, second in Stage 2, and incredible in clean air. Last year, traffic took me out of the race here, so that was on my mind, but I studied that race, calmed down, and everything worked out."

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Day led 118 laps but ran out of track to recover

Corey Day started from pole, led 118 of the 250 laps, and won both stages, the first stage wins of his entire career. Day was coming off a second-place finish at Martinsville last week and had accumulated six consecutive top 10s so far in his first full season in the category, but a slow stop during the stage break cost him five positions, and he could never recover them.

On lap 174, he had to make an unscheduled pit stop due to a loose lug nut, and from there the race became a comeback. He advanced from 24th place in the final 70 laps to finish tenth, extending his top-10 streak to seven in a row. "We had a couple of bad stops," said Day. "We got behind, and it was hard to get out of the hole."

The high grip level of the recently repaved Rockingham surface made passing between cars of similar performance very difficult, and track position became the determining factor in the second half of the race. Allgaier described it as an accordion effect where those behind would close in on the leader when there was traffic but couldn't complete the pass because they needed clean air to do so. "You had to make passes when you could," said Allgaier. "I didn't do a good job of that today, but when you walk away from here with stage points and a third place, it's hard to be too upset."

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Caruth made the Dash 4 Cash with a three-wide pass with nine laps to go

The top four finishers at Rockingham (Sawalich, Jones, Allgaier, and Rajah Caruth) earned eligibility to compete for the $100,000 Dash 4 Cash bonus at Bristol Motor Speedway next Saturday. Caruth secured his spot with a three-wide pass on Sheldon Creed and Carson Kvapil with nine laps remaining, giving him the fourth position, the best result of his career in the category. At Bristol, Caruth will switch from the JR Motorsports Chevrolet No. 88 to the Jordan Anderson Racing No. 32, as Kyle Larson will drive the No. 88 that weekend. Creed and Kvapil finished fifth and sixth respectively, and the top 10 was rounded out by Taylor Gray, Parker Retzlaff, Ryan Sieg, and Day with his comeback from 24th place.

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Allgaier's championship lead grew from 92 to 126 points

Allgaier couldn't win for the fourth time this season but collected stage points and a third-place finish that helped him extend his advantage over Jesse Love from the 92 points he had leaving Martinsville to 126 at Rockingham. The gap grew because Love had a disastrous race: he was bumped by Caruth, hit the outside wall, had to make an unscheduled pit stop on lap 153, and finished 27th, two laps down.