Ross Chastain sets his playoff agenda, says it’s ‘no Hail Melon, just go beat them’

Ross Chastain confirmed that there won’t be a Hail Melon 2.0 in 2023.

Ross Chastain sets his playoff agenda, says it’s ‘no Hail Melon, just go beat them’

Ross Chastain (Via IMAGO)

Trackhouse Racing’s Ross Chastain has made it to the playoff for the second time in his Cup career this season and is planning to make it to the championship four, just like in 2022. But he insists that he doesn’t want to relive the pressure of last year when he had to pull off some special skills from sleeves to make it to the final four.

In the final race of the Round of 8  last year, the fight for the last vacant was between Chastain and Joe Gibbs Racing’s Denny Hamlin. In the final laps of the race, he pulled off a video game move, the wall ride at Martinsville, to climb to the top 5 and secure the necessary finish to progress. It was one of the most memorable moments of the 2022 season and of all time.

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While talking about it and the coming second race of R-16, the 2023 Nashville Cup race winner pointed out that he doesn’t have any trick up his sleeves this year. He plans to scrap up as many points as he can and secure one or two wins in the process.

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“Nothing up these sleeves, nothing, [no] trick. We’ll just go and try to scrap up as many points as we can each round and transfer through – you know we can win one of these or a few of these. It’s okay to win, somebody’s got to. No Hail Melon, just go beat them,” he said, as reported by ProTalk.

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Ross Chastain trusts the process and feels good at Trackhouse

NASCAR, Motorsport, USA Cup Practice & Qualifying Aug 19, 2023; Watkins Glen, New York, USA; NASCAR Cup Series driver Da
Daniel Suarez and Ross Chastain (Via IMAGO)

Unlike the 2022 season, which saw Trackhouse Racing being contenders for wins in every other race with Chastain leading the team, 2023 has been difficult. The team failed to field cars capable of winning races with consistency, and it resulted in his teammate Daniel Suarez missing out on playoffs following a winless season.

But Chastain has no bad feelings but, on the contrary, has good feelings going into Kansas this Sunday. He pointed out that his crew worked hard to field better cars for him and Saurez. Chastain says that he trusts the process and there is no other team he wants to do it with.

“I do [feel good]. I wouldn’t want to do this with any other group. I’ve got 140 employees that are putting two race cars… It’s two race cars, two rocket ships getting taken down to Darlington. We haven’t changed our procedures, Daniel and I have been together every morning to start these playoffs. We’ll continue what we’re doing, and I trust our processes,” Chastain said.

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