DOVER, Del. – In a NASCAR Xfinity Series Playoff cutoff race that seemed to lack drama in the closing laps of Saturday afternoon’s Bar Harbor 200 at Dover (Del.) International Speedway, JD Motorsports driver Ross Chastain created some of his own attempting to make it through to the Round of 8.
After holding steady during Stage 1 of the race, Chastain stepped up to the plate and closed the gap on competitors Matt Tifft and Austin Cindric in Stage 2 finishing 10th.
Throughout Stage 3, Chastain in his No. 4 Use Your Melons Chevrolet hovered inside the top-12 waiting for the right opportunity to capitalize. Hoping to make some gains during the final round of pit stops at Lap 167, Chastain was tagged for speeding, sending him to the rear for the Lap 172 restart.
Aggressively clawing his way through the field, Chastain nearly found trouble while attempting to pass Matt Tifft and Chase Briscoe on Lap 178. Diving under Tifft in Turn 4, Tifft’s Chevrolet broke loose and made contact with Briscoe’s Ford – putting the No. 60 Ford Mustang into the wall and issuing the race’s fourth caution.
With minimal damage to Tifft and Chastain’s vehicle, the opportunity for chaos to ensue on the restart built up but never materialized. Chastain was able to quickly escape from Tifft’s sight while Tifft found himself hunkered in his own battle with several cars on the lead lap.
The race went green for the final 16 laps of the race and while Chastain stalled out in 13th, Tifft was able to pass the cars of Shane Lee and Ryan Reed giving him the cushion he needed of three points to edge Chastain for the final transfer spot.
Afterward, Chastain was upbeat despite being defeated acknowledging he was just thankful for the opportunity to be in the Playoffs with the support of JD Motorsports and his three-race stint with Chip Ganassi Racing.
“Too many mistakes on my part,” said Chastain. “I sped on pit road there – trying to roll up to those guys and do the best we could and just playing catch up from there. We had the car looking at it now to do it, I was just trying to go by those guys.
“He ran into me after we stopped down there for lug nut check but I’m not sorry at all. This is awesome.”
Often referred to as one of the most aggressive drivers on the Xfinity circuit, Chastain doesn’t make excuses for his tactics.
“This 4 car and what we’ve done with JD Motorsports and Chip Ganassi Racing to help me get here – running that car a couple of times with DC Solar is awesome and I don’t apologize for what I do on the race track, I bring my friends with me,” he added.
“Our Use Your Melons Chevrolet was fast enough to do it. It’s racing man. It’s awesome. We were in the heart of it. We did our job coming here and we got a lot to be proud about.”
Tifft finished 15th and although his performance wasn’t superb, the Hinckley, Ohio native was thankful to escape the Monster Mile with an opportunity to fight in the Round of 8.
“It was very tense, especially at the last part of the race,” Tifft said. “We weren’t very good today, we had a lot of really good strong runs, but unfortunately, today wasn’t one of them. Getting ourselves back in the hornets next between fifth and 20th place back there is going to be a mess.
“Got underneath the 60 car (Chase Briscoe) and I don’t know, I guess he (Ross Chastain) was going to drive through us, luckily, I was able to save it.
“There were a lot of words I probably shouldn’t be saying as I was trying to save it. You so on the edge of grip already that, when somebody gets into the back of you here, it’s everything you can do to save it, let alone hit another car in there.
“We got out of it and were able to focus on the next round. That’s out of my head now and we got big picture things to worry about and we’ve had some great top-five runs through this first round. We got a lot (of) speed, we’ll find it back. We’re focused on the championship.”
After the race, Tifft gently showcased his displeasure with Chastain with a bump on pit road, but Tifft said the contact was unintentional and he’s already focused on Kansas Speedway in two weeks.
“Ah, foot slipped off the clutch and tapped him,” he said. “I didn’t mean anything honestly. Like I said, we have bigger things to worry about. If we didn’t make it, I might be a bit more
upset, but we made it through and we did what we needed to do.”
Follow Chris Knight on Twitter @Knighter01.
