Martinsville, Va: Coming into the Xfinity 500 at Martinsville Speedway, Chase Elliott was confident with his chances to win and advance to the Championship 4.
“We’ve been right in the thick of it; right in the mix. When you’re giving yourselves those opportunities, why wouldn’t you be confident in coming to a place that we’ve been able to run well before?” stated Elliott prior to the race.
Unfortunately, the No. 9 NAPA Auto Parts Chevrolet driver, who was in a must-win situation, could not come up with the last push to retake the lead and win.
Starting the day in the second position, the Dawsonville, Georgia native would rise to the top spot by Lap 42.
With the caution flag coming out on Lap 78, Elliott would communicate to his team that, “I don’t think the car is in a bad spot, but I don’t want the rear to be any looser.”
Ultimately, the team brought him down pit road for a new set of Goodyear tires, fuel, and a slight adjustment, returning Elliott to the track in first place.
Winning Stage 1, his first stage win since the Daytona 500 in February, the Hendrick Motorsports driver continued to communicate with his team about the drive of his car and they told him that they would work on it and to focus forward, which seemed to be their theme for the race.
Stage 2 began with Elliott in control.
Running second for the first forty laps of Stage 2, the caution flag would come out for an incident on the track at Lap 185.
However, what should have been a regular pit stop became an issue when the right rear lug was tightened incorrectly on the ground and the team would have to come back to the right side of the car to correct the problem relegating Elliott to the 26th position in the field.
Working through the field throughout Stage 2, Chase Elliott would find him up to the 12th position by the end of the stage with the team telling him that he was the fastest car on the track.
Coming to pit road at the end of Stage 2, Elliott tells the team that his car is really tight, so they made a wedge adjustment and gave him another new set of tires and fuel.
Stage 3 would be hard fought by Chase Elliott but to no avail.
Starting in 11th place and moving forward, Elliott would have a run in with Chris Buescher the driver of the No. 17 Ford.
Buescher got very loose and traveled down the track when Elliott ran right into the back of his car.
“What the hell was he doing?” Elliott asked, but all the team had for him was “Never mind about that. Focus forward.”
Even with the encouragement of the team Elliott continued on about his car, “We’re getting killed coming off the corner now.”
Team spotter Trey Poole told his driver, “Take a deep breath here bud.”
Clearly irritated, Elliott did not take that advice too well. His response was, “I just need you to stop talking for a few minutes.”
Attempting to gain an advantage on the track, Elliott short-pitted for a set of tires and fuel on Lap 352 and worked his way back to the front of the field.
“It got us right there in the mix and we had an opportunity. I just made a couple of mistakes there past halfway and got some damage on our car.
I think that hurt a little bit. Just little things started stacking up,” a disappointed Elliott had to say.
With 30 laps to go and a win in sight, Elliott knew that it was go time, but it wasn’t meant to be.
On Lap 487, Elliott would be overtaken by the car of Ryan Blaney, and there was no catching up.
“I just felt like Ryan (Blaney) had been really good. I was scared to give him an opportunity to get to the No. 5 first,” Elliott said at the end of the race.
“I just really wanted to try to get the lead. And then you never know, maybe a caution comes out or something. It just didn’t work out for us.”
Even after leading the race five times with 129 laps led, Chase Elliott ended the race in second place, 2.593 seconds behind the leader, and out of the Championship 4.
“All I know is that we came up one spot short and it’s unfortunate,” lamented Elliott.
Next up for Chase Elliott will be the NASCAR Cup Series Championship at Phoenix Raceway on Sunday, November 10, 2024, at 3:00 p.m. ET.
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