The race at Texas on Sunday marking the beginning of Round of 12, witnessed the dominance of Bubba Wallace. Apart from earning his first pole position of the season, the driver led a whopping 111 laps in the race. Additionally, he managed to hold off Hendrick Motorsports’ Kyle Larson. However, he couldn’t hold onto his position during the final few laps of the race. William Byron surged from the rear of the field and scored the 300th victory for the team.
The No.24 Chevrolet driver was the only HMS driver who was able to finish within the top 10 of the leader, while Larson had to retire prematurely, and the golden boy of the team Chase Elliott failed to deliver a stellar finish and stands at a precarious position. Owing to this, the driver in his interview seemed to spill the beans behind his disappointing finish.
Chase Elliott laments his mistakes after his disappointing Texas outing
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Chase Elliot may not be eligible for the driver’s championship as he failed to qualify for the post-season. However, he still remains eligible for the owner’s championship. Elliot delivered top-10 results in all 3 races of the Round of 16 as he rebounded from an initial slump.
However, things went awry for the driver on the track in Texas even after leading for 44 laps. He failed to hold on to his position as a series of restarts ensued on the track. In his interview with FOX reporter Bob Pockrass, Elliott exclaimed the instances that threw a wrench at his favorable finish.
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He expressed, “Yeah, it was definitely disappointing, I thought we were at least in a spot leading a bunch of laps, but we were in a respectable position for a late-race restart. I got the lane choice I wanted. I wanted to be on the second row top, that was where my mind was at that point in time and I thought the 14 [Chase Briscoe] and 23 [Bubba Wallace] were going to race hard through Turns 1 and 2 and I was hoping for an opportunity down the back going through 3 and 4.”
“Had an okay restart, and got through 1 and 2 pretty good runs, and got tied just to keep from hitting the wall and that kind of choked my momentum and still ended up getting a little bit of a run to the outside of Bubba and I think he just kinda missed three and I was to his outside handed up getting run up into the dirty part of the track there and I don’t think that was anything intentional just kinda way it worked out,” he said.
Elliot aims to rebound in his next race as he still commends a good position in the standings.
The No.9 Chevrolet driver heaves out his satisfactory finish
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Before entering Sunday’s race in Texas, Elliott was 13 points below the cutline. However, the driver was able to collect points and is a deficit of 2 points for the owner’s championship. With the next race at Talladega, things are looking up for Elliott owing to his past results.
Nonetheless, continuing along the same lines, Elliott stated, “He was at a bad angle, and we both driving there real hard. Was gonna get into the trashy part of the track so once I got up there, I kept hanging there kinda get my car collected from crashing.”
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“The momentum when you park it like that you are just gonna get eaten up and that was also what might have happened. Definitely disappointing, we were respectable, did not want anything special but we thought we were okay but certainly in a good enough spot to capitalize, and didn’t work that way.”
Was focused on playoff drivers after the Texas race but was curious on Chase Elliott going from fourth on the final restart to finishing 11th. He explained what happened: pic.twitter.com/ecsM7o93kb
— Bob Pockrass (@bobpockrass) September 27, 2023
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With just two races left in the Round of 12, it is to be seen whether the most popular driver of NASCAR is able to put an end to his winless streak and whether he will be able to clinch the oner’s championship at the showdown in November.