Jesse Love overcome with emotion after winning NASCAR Xfinity Series championship

In the biggest moment of his NASCAR career, Jesse Love was overcome with emotion as he explained his Xfinity Series championship. In fact, he could barely explain it. Love had to beat his best friend to get the job done, and he had no problem doing just that.

Jesse Love has become the newest driver to earn a NASCAR Xfinity Series championship for Richard Childress Racing. He is the first to do it for RCR since Tyler Reddick. This is a big deal, not only for Love and his career but for an RCR program that needed a big moment like this.

As he tried to talk about the win, Love found it difficult to find the words. The feelings of realizing a lifelong dream were heavy in his voice and in his eyes.

“I just feel so clean, you know, relieved,” Jesse Love said on The CW. “It’s been a tough year for me, and man, I’ve just put so much work into it, and people like my dad and Scott Speed, and my whole 2 team that work just as hard for my dream as I have for my own. Thank you to Whelen. For one last time, this car was as fast as Xfinity Mobile. And it really hasn’t set in yet. I try to just tune out all the emotion. It doesn’t feel real. It doesn’t feel real at all.”

When asked about the dynamic he has with Connor Zilisch, Love was honest. They’re best friends, but they weren’t best friends for 200 laps tonight at Phoenix. They were competitors.

“Yeah, he’s my best friend in the whole world, but not when we’re racing each other,” Love explained. “We race each other hard but fair, and yeah, I knew I had to take it there. I knew he was going to put it on my door, I knew I had to throttle up and just get my nose ahead. … He was running a really good race. My car was just better tonight and allowed me to roll the center, get off the corner better. I mean, it was tongue out and wanted this. Hats off to the 88 team and Connor for all they’ve done this year. Tonight’s about my guys. I can’t believe it, you know?”

A win at Daytona to start the year, and a win at Phoenix to end it. That’s the championship formula for Love this season in the Xfinity Series.

Jesse Love had a ‘magic wrench’ from Danny Stockman

In the first stage of this race, Jesse Love looked lost. It was a struggle to keep up with the cars that he had qualified with. It was not the start that anyone on the RCR No. 2 team wanted to see. But that’s now when races are won.

Races are won on pit road more times than not. When everything goes great and the crew does their job, no one really says anything one way or another. But a mistake? That can cost a driver and a team a race or a championship.

Love talked about his early struggles. Thankfully, he’s got Danny Stockman as crew chief.

“We were so bad to start. I couldn’t believe how bad we were,” Jesse Love said. “We were awful. And Danny put one of his magic wrenches in there, and we came to life. Man, I’m just so grateful for everybody at ECR … This means the world to me and everybody that’s been on this journey with me over the last few years, and especially the last eight months or so I’ve really tried to just rebuild myself and come back better. So, I just, I feel so clean and relieved.”