This year’s NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs have been an uphill battle for Chase Elliott and the No. 9 Hendrick Motorsports team.
The 2020 Cup Series champion has yet to score a victory in the playoffs and has an average finish of 13.75 through the first eight races.
However, Elliott, who enters Sunday’s elimination race 43 points below the cutline, believes the tides are turning for his No. 9 team despite facing a must-win situation.
Elliott finished fifth last week at Homestead-Miami Speedway after leading 81 of the 267 laps at the 1.5-mile oval. It was only the fourth race Elliott led double digit laps all season.
“Well I think it’s a collective effort,” Elliott began. “It’s not just like a ‘magic button.. go fast’. That’s just not how it works. It’s a collective effort of time, effort, conversation — what do I need out of my car to give me the most comfort? That might be a little different for everyone. And I think also, adjusting your driving style to suit what the car wants in those configurations to go fast.
“So it’s very much a collective effort. It’s required me to look at things a little differently, I think from a driver’s standpoint. So it’s not one thing, and I just think as you collectively get better and you gain some confidence in different areas, then that’s just a step. And then you try to find what it takes to take another step. The steps are very, very small,” Elliott continued.
“You’re not taking big jumps. Little bits here and there can make a huge difference, especially with the landscape that we’re in nowadays, as you well know.”
The step-by-step approach is one aspect of Elliott’s confidence level. The other?
He and his team’s comfortability in championship-chasing scenarios.
In 2020, Elliott entered the cutoff race at Martinsville only 10 points above the cutline. He went on to win convincingly at “The Paperclip” and secure a spot in the title race at Phoenix Raceway, where he won the race and title a week later.
“Just having been in that spot before,” Elliott explained. “We’ve been fortunate enough to get to the Round of 8 a handful of times. Being in a ‘must-win’ at Martinsville is not necessarily a good thing, right? You would have much rather already punched your ticket or be in a points situation that is not last. That would also be good, too. There’s good and bad that comes with having the experience of being where we’re at. But we have and that’s the reality.
“The reality is that we have to go out here and perform at an extremely high level. If the weekend isn’t perfect, it’s got to be really close. I think the more you put yourself in those positions, the more you feel comfortable in those position and just are able to recognize the important factors that go into ultimately what’s going to give us the best result on Sunday,” Elliott continued.
“You just dial that in and go to work. We’ve had a good week of preparation, I feel like. We’ll find out here shortly, kind of where we’re at.”
Elliott qualified second for Sunday’s Xfinity 500 at Martinsville.