“I just want to go check on him and make sure he’s alright.” These words came from Jesse Love at Talladega. The Richard Childress Racing driver shares brotherly love with his friend Connor Zilisch, exchanging cheeky blows every week. After Love lost his hard-earned Rockingham victory, Zilisch teased his P38 result. But fast forward to a week later, and that friendly banter turned into a serious discussion.

The Xfinity Series recently unfolded at Talladega Superspeedway, a formidable 2.66-mile oval. Yet, drivers were relatively peaceful at the race as compared to the earlier outing at Martinsville. Despite this unlikely situation, two best friends got involved in a nasty wreck, and Jesse Love felt remorseful.

Jesse Love reveals his heart full of regret

Well, the No. 2 Chevrolet driver gritted his teeth a little too hard on Saturday. In Rockingham, Jesse Love led for 53 laps and fended off hard charges by Sammy Smith and others to fetch the victory. Even after this amount of hard work, Love could not hoist his first non-superspeedway flag as a technical disqualification stripped his win. So he came with a determined mindset to Talladega.

Leading for a race-high 50 of the 113 laps, Love won the first stage and finished second in the next. However, problems set in on the last trip around the Alabama track. Love was drafting behind Zilisch and ahead of Hill. This three-car draft is a risky maneuver, and today’s race showed us exactly why. Hill bumped Love, which moved him inside and caused him to tap Zilisch, causing the latter to spin at high speed and crash into the inside wall nose-first. The No. 88 Chevrolet’s rear tires were lifted completely off the ground due to the massive impact.

After clinching third place, Jesse Love was visibly worried about his friend’s condition. In a post-race interview with Frontstretch, he rewatched the incident and asked the press: “I think I f—— wrecked him. Oof. He alright? Is he alright?” Upon getting a positive response, he heaved a sigh of relief: “He’s not dead, so that’s good.” Love then went on to describe what happened with heavy remorse.

“They say ‘thrandem’ (three cars drafting in a line) is illegal for a reason ’cause we end up wrecking… We were thrandeming pretty hard, me, Connor and and the 21. I don’t know, probably have to watch it a few times. But at that point, man, all you can do is put yourself in position at these races. We do that and we do it a lot. And the 21 has done it a lot longer. I think that there’s definitely going to be things that I could have done differently. I think I’m more upset that I turned the 88 around than I ran third. So, just a bummer on that part.”

After the wreck, Connor Zilisch gingerly climbed from the car. Soon after, he was checked and released from the infield care center. He reflected on the incident: “That was one of the wrecks when you move the legs and make sure everything feels okay afterwards…I haven’t really watched it close enough to see what happened, but grateful to be up and walking.” But more importantly, the JR Motorsports driver hailed his friend who came to check up on him. “Jesse’s probably my best friend in the world. Grateful to have someone like him who can come and stand in front of me and give me a hug after that.”

These words of acknowledgment from his friend must have produced feelings of relief in Jesse Love. He could relax about the rest of the race, which went well.

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Reflecting on a solid day

As is evident, two Richard Childress Racing drivers are setting the Xfinity Series on fire this season. Austin Hill and Jesse Love are both dominating the races so far. Hill clinched his third victory of the season at Talladega Superspeedway today. After Connor Zilisch’s wreck brought out the caution flag, Hill battled with Jeb Burton and his teammate for the finish, but Jeb Burton felt he deserved the win.

Despite Burton’s adamant complaints, Hill won that race and became the all-time winningest driver on drafting-style tracks in the Xfinity Series, breaking a tie with Dale Earnhardt and Tony Stewart. Meanwhile, his teammate is also snuggling with the stars. Love won the season-opener at Daytona, and despite his Rockingham win being taken away, he has been a beacon of consistency this season with 7 top-10 finishes so far. Talladega witnessed him putting on his best form. He won the pole, led the most laps, and dominated the stages. Given that Love is just in his sophomore season, these consecutive good performances speak volumes about his potential.

However, Jesse Love is not selfish in success. He hailed his No. 2 team for putting in a solid effort. “I still feel proud of our guys; we ran a really good race today. We were up front. I feel like, as much as you can dominate these things, we dominated as much as we could… Once I realized that you have to lift a lot in the pack to get pushes, then I kind of turned a light bulb on. I could do whatever I wanted, really.” Love continued, “The car was really good… typically when I go to the back, I can’t go to the front, especially when my pit crew balls out. They did that this weekend, but I was also able to make some moves on my own. I’m just proud of the organization.”

Evidently, Jesse Love tried to make the most out of the day. Despite wrecking his friend, he made sure to apologize and look forward to improving his race.