Bubba Wallace giving back to Xfinity Rewards members amid push for playoffs

Even though Bubba Wallace is in the midst of an uphill battle to make the NASCAR Playoffs, he’s giving back to fans. Another year 23XI Racing and Xfinity are giving fans a chance to be featured on the No. 23 Toyota Camry.

Bubba Wallace had 65 fans on his car for the Xfinity 500 at Martinsville Speedway last year. It was a fun way to give back to fans and let them be part of the action. This year for the race, they’re going big.

500 fans are going to be featured on Wallace’ Toyota Camry at Martinsville. Fans can enter now for a chance to be featured on the Xfinity Rewards car, with the opportunity ending this Friday, August 30th.

Last week, ahead of the Daytona race weekend, I spoke with Bubba Wallace about the car, his push for the NASCAR Playoffs, and more.

These are the kind of things that Bubba Wallace and 23XI love doing for fans. It helps connect them in ways other teams don’t. That is what makes them different.

“It’s what you know attracts new fans and new partners because we do try to be different and with Xfinity coming on board, becoming a part of the sport a handful of years ago, you could already tell that was one of their core values was being different,” Wallace said.

“And being able to partner with them last year and continue on the partnership to this year is something that we both enjoy because it gives us opportunities to have those meetings to figure out what we can do to stand out and to give back to our fans, the Xfinity customers.”

Bubba Wallace is hoping that he will still be in the NASCAR Playoffs when Martinsville comes around.

Clearing outside distractions

While Bubba Wallace enters Darlington 21 points outside of the playoffs, he has made a strong push. There was a time, before upset drivers like Harrison Burton, when Wallace was more than 50 points out.

Throughout the last few weeks, the 23 car has gone from outside the 16-driver field to in, to back out. During this push for the postseason, Wallace has been off social media. Something that can be hard for athletes at times.

With Tyler Reddick in position to clinch the regular season championship and Bubba fighting to be in the playoffs, each team has their own points situation going on. Even with struggles, morale at 23XI has been high.

At least, it was coming off the rough weekend at Michigan.

“That’s the one thing, you have your day of being pissed off and frustrated and then you move on because we still have a couple of races left so you can’t dwell in the past, can’t change what happened. So, we just gotta go out and be better and put ourselves in a better spot. That’s what we can control. The team morale has been really good. Little bit of a step back for the 23 but not a spot we haven’t been in before.”

Now, Wallace was obviously frustrated after the Daytona race. He missed out on a ton of points and once again, had a winning car. P6 despite damage wasn’t bad, but Burton winning puts the 23 team in a bind.

We will find out if that morale has remained high as the weekend at Darlington begins on Saturday.

Bubba Wallace weighs racing for points or the win

In Michigan, Bubba Wallace had the lead when a late caution came out in Stage 1. He opted to take tires and fuel to flip the stage. Despite giving up track position, Wallace rallied to finish P4 in the stage.

Then, due to his strategy, in Stage 2, he was caught up in Kyle Larson’s mess. At Daytona, he was caught up in someone else’s mess again. Those incidents, for Wallace, can’t allow him and his team to waver from their strategy.

Sometimes, racing is about wrong place, wrong time.

“[Before Michigan] I said, ‘If we unload and we have a car that’s stupid fast, then we’re going to be able to pass and get back up through the field.’ And we did just that,” Wallace explained.

As for the wreck that took him out of contention:

“That was the cards that we were dealt with,” Wallace said. “We also know there’s no free lunch and with any move you make in motorsports, so with one move comes the whole other set of opportunities and unfortunately we got caught up in someone else’s mess.

“So, can’t really blame that on our strategy piece because we were doing everything to set us up for the win and that’s all you can ask for. Moving forward that’s just what you’ve got to focus on is if you’re a fifth, tenth place car maybe you stay out and get points. But just knowing there by the end it’s going to be hard to make up that track position because you’re not flipping stages. Because it’s all circumstantial.”

With only Darlington remaining, we will see if the circumstances fall in Bubba Wallace’s favor.