With five Nationwide Series starts under his belt, Chase Elliott is off to a good start this year with JRM Motorsports as he has posted four top 10 finishes, highlighted by a fifth at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
“I think so far it’s been okay,” Elliott said speaking of his season to date. “I think there’s been some ups and downs, and some weekends there’s been things that we could do a lot better. I think every weekend there’s been room for improvement and hopefully we can find those areas and try to improve things and get to where we need to be.”
Going into the year, some people had high expectations on Elliott based on how highly he was spoken by Rick Hendrick, being son of Bill Elliott and his success in the limited number of dates that he ran in the Camping World Truck Series last season. In nine starts last year, the 18-year-old posted five top-fives and seven top-10s, including a win at Canadian Tire Motorsports Park.
“I felt like we had a good truck and put ourselves in a good position,” Elliott reflected back on his first win. “You never want to win one with controversy but unfortunately we did with getting into Ty (Dillon) there. But sometimes it happens and it was nice to get that win. Hopefully we have success this year on the road courses.”
So far matching pre-season expectations, Elliott attributes that to the experience surrounding him.
“I think a lot of is because of the team with Greg Ives having experience, having run the whole season and being able to jump in with a team that had success last year at these bigger tracks,” Elliott said. “Even though we’ve had good runs, I feel there’s room for improvement in being able to keep up with the really good cars. I honestly thought there was a lot of room for improvement at Bristol, too. So far, I feel like we’ve had some decent runs – but not where we need to be.”
After a weekend off, the Nationwide Series returns this weekend with a trip to Texas Motor Speedway, a track that has featured first-time winners in the past. Elliott says he’s excited going into this weekend.
“I feel like we had a fairly good run at Las Vegas and I feel like Las Vegas will be really similar to Texas,” Elliott added. “I’ve never been there before, but watching, it looks like it’ll be a fairly similar race track. Looking to taking some of the things that we learned at Las Vegas to Texas and having a better run there.”
Elliott will have teammates Regan Smith, Kevin Harvick and Dale Earnhardt Jr. to lean on as JRM has entered four cars into this weekend’s event.
“Honestly, so far I feel like there’s been a lot of great supporters all the way around,” Elliott commented. “At JRM, I feel that everyone has welcomed me with open arms and I feel like having the support from those guys and being able to learn from guys that have won races at all levels from Sprint Cup to Nationwide. A lot of those guys have a lot of great experience and I’ve tried to take in as much experience as possible from them.”
With Earnhardt and Harvick entered into this weekend’s race beyond others, the topic of Sprint Cup Series drivers running Nationwide Series races is certianly at the forefront. Elliott says for him, he’s always supported the “double dippers”.
“I feel like it’s a good thing for the Nationwide Series,” he commented. “I feel it definitely makes it for challenging as those guys are at the level that they’re at for a reason. I feel like they deserve to go race whatever when they want to and I feel it’s good to have them as you can learn a lot from them and I enjoy having them around.”
Throughout his whole career, Elliott has had his father to lean on for advice as Bill Elliott can be seen on the radio each weekend at the track, sharing his thoughts. Over the course of his career to date, the second generation driver say there isn’t a piece of advice that his dad has given him that stands out.
“There isn’t one piece that stands out as they’ve all been important,” Elliott said. “From watching him over the years to the pieces of advice that he gave me along the way.”
