Asked what he needed on the last few laps to have gotten the win, Chase Elliott said he just needed “a better restart.”
The driver of the No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet will be able to say he finished runner-up in both races in the backyard of Chevrolet. He led 31 laps and was in prime position to score his first career victory in the Sprint Cup Series after he exited pit road ahead of eventual race winner Kyle Larson on the final round of green flag stops with 54 laps to go.
He assumed the lead with 31 laps to go and was pulling away from Larson until a tire carcass from the No. 46 of Michael Annett brought out the caution with 13 laps to go.
On the restart with nine laps to go, he spun the tires, Larson got a shove by Brad Keselowski and took the lead. Elliott made quick work of Keselowski, but couldn’t run down the No. 42 Chip Ganassi Racing Chevrolet in the closing laps.
After the race, he was asked what he needed to get the win.
“Just a better restart again,” he said. “That was what it was all about for sure. Once that guy (Larson) got out front it was really hard to pass.”
As is usually the case with Elliott, he put most of the blame on himself.
“My guys did such a good job today of making the most of pit road,” he added. “That was the only place you could make a large sum of ground in a short period of time. They did exactly what I asked them to do. I said ‘you guys are going to have to bail me out here I messed up.’ They did they got us the lead just like I asked and I gave it away again. It’s one of those things where you do or you don’t and I didn’t. You just got to recognize your mistakes, look at the positives I guess and move on down the road.”
When asked if he was frustrated and/or disappointed during his post-race media availability, Elliott said he’d “be lying if I said I wasn’t. If I wasn’t, that would mean I didn’t care. So, you know, for me, just have to try to take the positives out of it, recognize an issue when you see one. There’s only one way to fix it, and that’s to hit it head on. No need of hiding from it. Just try to fix it. Hope you have more opportunities to improve and to show that you can do it down the road…there’s no guarantees in life. There’s certainly no guarantees in racing. Have to recognize that, and like I said, hit it head on.”
The same mishap befell him back in June on a late restart at Michigan where he spun the tires leading the race and lost the victory to Joey Logano.
Elliott leaves Michigan 11th in points and 14th on the Chase grid if the Chase started today.
