HMS’s Chad Knaus breaks silence on Chase Elliott running out of fuel at Watkins Glen

Chad Knaus revealed that Hendrick Motorsports handled the fuel mishap internally and moved on from it.

HMS’s Chad Knaus breaks silence on Chase Elliott running out of fuel at Watkins Glen

Chad Knaus (Credits: Autoweek) Chase Elliott (PA Homepage)

All Chase Elliott wanted was to win at Sunday’s Go Bowling at The Glen at Watkins Glen International and qualify for the NASCAR Cup Series playoffs. Fate had other plans as his No. 9 Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 ran out of fuel on Lap 55 and brought out caution. As a result, he finished 32nd and is in a must-win spot at Daytona to enter the playoffs. Hendrick Motorsports vice president Chad Knaus gave insight into the fuel mishap for the No.9 Chevy at Watkins Glen. 

Knaus explained that the team knew what happened and described the event as unfortunate. The 52-year-old spoke about how close they were to a win at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, where the 2020 NASCAR Cup champion Chase Elliott finished runner-up behind Michael McDowell. Chad Knaus felt that if they won at Indy, they wouldn’t have been in this situation now. 

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Chad Knaus told Sirius XM NASCAR Radio, “Yeah, we know exactly what happened, and it is unfortunate. Timing in life is everything right, and it’s unfortunate that it happened at that time to the team, a great race team. They are trying to get their footing, and they just came off an amazing race in Indianapolis where they ran second and if we had a caution, or so maybe we had an opportunity or less traffic, we would have the opportunity to go out there and aim for the win, and we wouldn’t even be in this situation talking about it today.” 

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Chad Knaus explains that it gets difficult to make calls during a race

Chad Knaus (Credits: USA Today)
Chad Knaus (Credits: USA Today) 

Knaus added, “But those things happen, and as you are always trying to get everything you can out of the race cars, you know it gets really difficult sometimes to make those calls. And you know there were some issues that we uncovered, and we handled those internally, and we were able to move on.” Chad Knaus assured the fans that the issues have been handled. 

A fuel miscalculation saw Chase Elliott run out of gas with the remaining 36 laps. It is safe to say that it was a terrible weekend for the Hendrick Motorsports driver. Now Elliott’s only chance to enter the playoffs is to win at Daytona, as he won’t be able to qualify on points. However, he claimed that winning there wouldn’t be easy. 

Chase Elliott has never won at Daytona International Speedway, though he was the 2016 and 2017 Daytona 500 pole winner. He has one shot left, and it is a win-or-go-home situation. Hence, the pressure is on for the No.9 Chevrolet driver. Elliott’s team did not help his cause of making it into the playoffs at Watkins Glen. They have another chance at Daytona. It remains to be seen if they will make wise decisions and push the former Cup champion into the playoffs. 

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