close
close

Chase Elliott wins the Texas NASCAR Cup race, ending his 42-race winning streak

Field level media
| USA TODAY NETWORK

play

Chase Elliott said last week after his third-place finish at Martinsville Speedway that he had a feeling victory day was coming.

It arrived in the Lone Star State on Sunday.

Elliott broke a 42-race winning streak by holding off Brad Keselowski and William Byron in double overtime to win Sunday's caution-filled NASCAR Cup Series race at Texas Motor Speedway.

Elliott and Denny Hamlin again started on the front row twice in the final regular laps, but Hamlin issued the 14th caution in Turn 4 on the outside of Elliott's No. 9 Chevrolet.

After Harrison Burton's accident caused the 15th caution, Elliott restarted and won a drag race on the backstretch with Chastain, who also crashed in the process and waved the final yellow flag. Elliott thus secured victory under yellow in the 276-lap race, the ninth race of the season. Chastain finished 32nd

“It couldn’t feel better,” said a relieved Elliott, who won for the first time in Texas in his 14th start. “I couldn't be more grateful for this journey and the path that hasn't always been fun. (Our team) worked really hard together.”

The six-time NASCAR Most Popular Driver said the course, which resulted in 15 cautions, was difficult, including navigating Turn 4, which claimed Hamlin's No. 11 Toyota.

“This track is so patchy,” he said. “I haven't seen a repeat of Denny and Us, but I don't think I did anything crazy.

The win was the 19th of Elliott's career and first since his victory at Talladega on October 2, 2022.

Keselowski finished second with Byron, Tyler Reddick and Daniel Suarez rounding out the top five.

The full results can be found here.

In the NASCAR Cup Series' only stop at the 1.5-mile track, Kyle Larson started from the front and wanted to prove he was as good as his hot lap in Saturday's qualifying.

Larson's No. 5 Chevrolet dominated most of the first stage, only briefly relinquishing the lead to teammate Elliott after the pit stop. He then returned to the lead and won the 80-lap segment ahead of Christopher Bell and Hamlin.

The only incident occurred when seven-time Cup champion Jimmie Johnson, who had an accident in Saturday practice, looped while going through Turns 3 and 4 on lap 50.

Ryan Blaney, Austin Hill, Ty Gibbs and Chris Buescher decided not to stop and led the restart of the 85-lap Stage 2.

But as dominant as Larson appeared to be, he couldn't escape mechanical failure as his right rear wheel came off under caution on the frontstretch. NASCAR held the Chevrolet in pit road and assessed a two-lap penalty.

Larson was a lap down when Michael McDowell had a serious accident in Turn 4 after racing alongside Chastain with 23 laps to go in the second stage.

Chastain earned the segment bonus point in his first stage win of 2024.

Reddick's No. 45 Toyota soon worked its way past Burton's No. 21 Ford with 88 laps remaining.

Tags:

You may also like...

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *