Elliott Rallies From The Rear For Kansas Top 10

Chase Elliott (9) battles Todd Gilliland Sunday at Kansas Speedway. (Rusty Jarrett/Nigel Kinrade Photography)

KANSAS CITY, Kan. – Chase Elliott was met with immediate adversity to kick off the next phase of his quest for a second NASCAR Cup Series championship, but wound up compiling a methodical climb from the rear of the field Sunday at Kansas Speedway.

Despite engine woes that buried Elliott last on the grid for the Hollywood Casino 400 presented by ESPN BET, he showed his resiliency in ultimately posting a ninth-place finish with the No. 9 UniFirst Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 in the Round of 12 opener.

Expectations were high for Hendrick Motorsports going into the fourth race of the Cup Series playoffs, following a dominating display by Kyle Larson and a runner-up result from six-time NMPA Most Popular Driver Elliott in the Round of 16 finale at Bristol (Tenn.) Motor Speedway.

There was also optimism going into the 1.5-mile track for Elliott, seeing as he finished third in May, in addition to holding the best-average finish at Kansas among active Cup Series drivers (10.2) in 17 starts there.

But those notions were almost instantaneously tempered, after a mechanical issue in practice forced crew chief Alan Gustafson and the No. 9 team to swap engines and line up dead-last for the 267-lap playoff race.

If that wasn’t enough, before Elliott could complete a lap, he ran into trouble while charging from the rear of the field.

Trying to maximize track position to start the race, he forced his car into a four-wide situation and brushed the wall on the backstretch, following a collision between A.J. Allmendinger and Harrison Burton after the duo attempted to evade a slowing Chris Buescher in the middle lane.

Suffering only minor cosmetic damage to the right-rear, Elliott was able to stay on track and establish some rhythm. Although he failed to score any points in stage one, he was fast enough to work his way up to 19th and outpace fellow playoff drivers Larson, Chase Briscoe and Daniel Suarez – who all lost a lap.

Following some much-needed adjustments, the No. 9 team found speed and enabled Elliott to compete with frontrunners including four-time Kansas winner Denny Hamlin. The Dawsonville, Ga., native finally made his first appearance in the top 10 with just under 20 to go in stage two.

Right before the third of three cautions flew in a span of 13 laps, Gustafson ordered his driver to “be aggressive” in an effort to capitalize on the stage points they missed out on in the opening segment.

Holding true to his word, Elliott made slight contact with the left side of eventual race winner Ross Chastain’s No. 1 while battling for eighth, en route to a ninth-place finish and a pair of stage points in stage two.

After exiting pit road where he entered, Elliott restarted the final stage back in 27th, as 18 teams opted to pit following the lap-158 caution and thus flipped the stage at the second stage break.

Having to surge his way through the field yet again, the 2020 Cup Series champion rallied to finish ninth as the sixth-highest scoring playoff driver of the afternoon.

“We just had an uphill battle all day,” Elliott said. “I really thought our No. 9 UniFirst Chevy was pretty good. We were able to move forward a long way, it seemed like. Since we had a bad pit pick, ultimately it just put us in a bad position to lose spots on pit road. It just seemed like we would get a bunch of spots on the track, and then lose a bunch of spots on pit road.

“We tried to claw our way back up into the top 10, so it was nice to at least get that far.”

Entering Kansas, Elliott was six points above the cutoff as the seventh-ranked playoff driver. With his ninth-place finish, both in the race and in stage two, he racked up 30 points – the seventh-most of those vying for the Bill France Cup – leaving him with a net loss of only two points.

Elliott leaves Kansas four above the cutoff and has now scored three top 10s through an important four-race stretch, with a seventh-place average in the postseason.

He’ll look to score his third win at Talladega (Ala.) Superspeedway and avoid chaos as the Round of 12 continues with the YellaWood 500 on Sunday, Oct. 6 at 2 p.m. ET on NBC, the Motor Racing Network, and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, channel 90.