There are 2,383.42 Miles 2 Miami!
Chase Elliott became the second-ever winner of the
Charlotte Motor Speedway ROVAL on Sunday afternoon in Concord, North Carolina
after nearly wiping himself out of the race. The Dawsonville, Georgia native
captured his third win of the season and locked himself into the Round of 12 of
the 2019 NASCAR Playoffs.
The 24-year-old won his third road course victory and
sixth career win in the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series.
“Oh, my gosh, what a mistake, holy moly,” said
Elliott. “You talk about messing something up, right here — don’t do that. What
a day. Such a fast NAPA Camaro ZL1, and honestly that was the only reason we
were able to get back in it. I pretty well blew it and got the cautions at the
right time and brought it home. … But I don’t think that I could have done
anything more stupid, leading that race.”
Elliott was able to overcome an accident on Lap 65
after driving straight into the tire barrier. He drove his way forward from the
37th position and passed Kevin Harvick for the lead on the final restart.
Elliott’s teammate Alex Bowman finished second while
clinching a spot into the Round of 12 with Kevin Harvick, Clint Bowyer, and
Brad Keselowski rounding out the top-five. As usual, during the last race of
each round, the playoff cutoff was something to keep an eye on during the Bank
of America ROVAL 400.
Erik Jones's accident on Lap 23 knocked him out of the
race and eliminated him from championship contention. Bowman and Ryan Newman
were in a tight battle for the 12th position but with a lap to go Newman missed
that backstretch chicane and ended up finishing 32nd. He finished 14th in
points.
Stewart-Haas Racing driver Aric Almirola stayed on the
track on the Lap 89 caution, where he couldn’t keep up with the front runners. Pitting
in Lap 95, he restarted in the back of the pack and had to make up multiple
positions to make it into the next round but fell short by five points.
The biggest headline of the race for the final spot in
the Round of 12 was Bowman. With a few mistakes during the event and an
incident with Bubba Wallace, he was able to drive his way into the second
position and clinch his spot into the next round.
"Yeah, I don’t know if he was mad about the first
lap, or what, but obviously that was just a mistake," Bowman said.
"And then I got flipped off every single straightaway on the entire race
track for three laps. I got flipped off by him for like three or four laps in a
row at Richmond, so I’m just over it.”
After the race, Wallace would approach Bowman while he
was sitting beside his car suffering from dehydration and douse him with water.
It is the second driver in two weeks Bowman has an in-race incident.
Other notable playoff drivers like Joey Logano, Ryan
Blaney, Martin Truex Jr., William Byron, Brad Keselowski, Kyle Busch, and Denny
Hamlin had solid days and advanced to the Round of 12.
The next race on the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series
schedule is the Dover 400 on Sunday, Oct. 6 at Dover International Speedway. It
starts at 2:30 p.m. EDT with live coverage provided by NBCSN and SiriusXM
NASCAR Radio.
Here
are the standings going into Dover:
