Subscribe

Sign up for free

  • Get quick access to your favorite articles

  • Manage alerts on breaking news and favorite drivers

  • Make your voice heard with article commenting.

Motorsport prime

Discover premium content
Subscribe

Edition

Australia

Chase Elliott's "flawless" performance impresses Rick Hendrick

Chase Elliott ended the day just short – again – of his first Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series victory but perhaps did gain something just as important.

Chase Elliott, Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet

Chase Elliott, Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet

Brett Moist / Motorsport Images

Chase Elliott, Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet
Chase Elliott, Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet
Chase Elliott, Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet
Chase Elliott, Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet
Chase Elliott, Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet

Without mistakes, Elliott and his No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports team discovered they can be a contender for this season’s championship.

That was team owner Rick Hendrick’s assessment as he was the first to meet Elliott once he exited his car on pit road following his second-place finish Sunday at Chicagoland Speedway in the opening race of the NASCAR playoffs.

Elliott, 21, led 42 of the 267 laps – the second-most he’s led in a race this season (he led 106 at the spring Phoenix race).

“I’m really proud of (Elliott) and the team. He’s had some rough luck and he’s so good on these mile-and-a-half tracks. It’s a great start,” Hendrick said.

“He led some laps today; that felt good. Everybody has been working hard and we have some good tracks coming up for us. I really want to get to Dover, New Hampshire is good, Texas. The mile-and-a-halves are good to us.

“The No. 24 team was flawless all day, that’s really all you can ask for. We’re in it, you never know when somebody else is going to make a mistake.”

A mistake is what Elliott said he would likely have needed from race-winner Martin Truex Jr. in order to catch him at the end.

As strong as Elliott ran during the race, he said over his team radio as the race drew to a close that he thought Truex got even better at the end.

 

Asked about his comments after the race, Elliott said, “Once he got out front, he was just riding. He knew we all had enough gas to get to the end and he knew if the caution didn’t come out, it was going to be the longest run of the day.

“Once I kind of got cleared of traffic, he took off and ran like he could and got a big enough gap where I was no issue through lapped traffic. He was just managing his pace and tires on that last run.”

Six of the 16 drivers in the playoffs – including Truex – got caught speeding on pit road during the race. Elliott’s team avoided any of those problems and consistently remained in the top-five throughout the race.

Elliott’s Stage 2 victory was the first stage win for a Hendrick driver since the road course race at Sonoma, Calif., in June.

“It was nice to see that we can do it if all things are clicking in the right way, car is driving good, pit stops are good, race execution was nice. It was a pretty uneventful race for the most part,” Elliott said.

“I felt like typically when that happens, the better cars always kind of end up towards the front. That proved to be with Martin winning. I didn't have anything for him, without a restart or something.

“It also proved that we were second to him. I'm not sure about (Kyle Busch), if he could have got back up there. Aside from those two, I feel like we could run about everybody else.

“That's a lot better than we've been.”

 Watch Elliott talk about his finish on Sunday:

Be part of Motorsport community

Join the conversation
Previous article Truex opens NASCAR Cup playoffs with impressive Chicagoland win
Next article Harvick on podium: "We finished right where we should have"

Top Comments

There are no comments at the moment. Would you like to write one?

Sign up for free

  • Get quick access to your favorite articles

  • Manage alerts on breaking news and favorite drivers

  • Make your voice heard with article commenting.

Motorsport prime

Discover premium content
Subscribe

Edition

Australia