“You’re Kinda Behind Already” – Chase Elliott Continues His Darlington Disappointment With Another Shaky Start

Ranking third with the playoffs just around the corner is exciting indeed. However, it can also be stressful with a heap of expectations on your shoulders, as Chase Elliott is facing right now. After scoring his redemption win at Texas early this year, the Hendrick Motorsports driver followed it up with a streak of consistent finishes. Yet now at Darlington, his luck seems to be running low.

Elliott finished 12th in the spring race and stocked up a double run in his schedule for the second time. Yet both Xfinity and Cup held some poor starts in store for him. Although he finished in the top five on Saturday, Elliott is scratching his head as he gears up for the Southern 500.

Chase Elliott pulls a long face for Darlington

The final regular season race of the Cup Series is all set to flag off at Darlington Raceway. But before getting ready to tame the Cup event, Chase Elliott visited the Lady in Black for Xfinity. His qualifying results stooped low, as the Hendrick driver started in 17th place. Yet he did wheel the No. 17 Chevy to the front row, taking advantage of a late restart and finishing 4th. However, Elliott’s Cup rival Christopher Bell won the race. Peer pressure, coupled with poor Cup qualifying (20th place), has gotten Elliott worried.

The press crowded around Chase Elliott to ask him about his Xfinity outing, but the driver seemed gloomy. “I don’t know. Hopefully, just a couple of driving things. But we’ll see when the day starts.” 

The sultry heat got on his nerves, added to the fact that his qualifying woes doubled for the Cup Series. He said it’s important to “just hydrate, you know. You’re kind of behind already. So the good news is (not) racing till 6 tomorrow night. So you got some time to get some fluids back in you.” 

Yet Chase Elliott refrained from blaming it on his car, claiming he was “really proud” of his team for the remarkable pit stops. Instead, he took it on himself, and said, “The car was great. I just, I struggled here. So maybe I had to get into a good rhythm. Even when I got into a good rhythm, it’s not a great rhythm, you know. It’s just kind of decent. So trying to work through it, find a little bit here and there…Gotta compete with the good guys here tomorrow night.” 

Despite Chase Elliott’s apprehensions, some insiders believe him to be a top contender in Darlington. With only an 18-point cushion over Tyler Reddick’s top spot, Elliott also looks solid as a potential champion. Meanwhile, the Hendrick driver is equally excited about next year’s revamped schedule as well.

International grounds enthralling Elliott

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As the regular season draws to a close this year, NASCAR is already cooking up its 2025 plans. For the first time since 1958, the sport will venture across foreign borders for a points-paying Cup Series race. Instead of going north to Canada, it will go south into Mexico. This new initiative has fascinated some drivers already, including Chase Elliott. The HMS driver won his first NASCAR national series victory at a Truck Series event at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park.

He is pumped to try his driving prowess on a foreign racetrack again. Chase Elliott hailed the NASCAR leadership for its innovative ventures as we gear up for Mexico City racing next year.

Sharing his appreciation and excitement, Elliott said, “The leadership group at NASCAR has been exploring a lot of different things that historically would probably have never happened, so I give them a lot of credit for that. I think to get outside the country is really a pretty cool thing. And it’s a pretty cool honor for us to have a following big enough to be able to leave and go somewhere and have an event and draw a big enough crowd for it to be successful. I think it’s really good and it’s healthy, and it’s something that we should probably look at doing if it goes well.”

Although Darlington is stressing out Chase Elliott currently, next year’s novel schedule may be enough to uplift his spirits. Let us see whether our top-point contender dazzles us at year-end.