“To win at your home track is a really big deal,” Chase Elliott wins in his hometown Atlanta 30 years after his father Bill Elliott
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Chase Elliott wins Atlanta Cup Race
The Atlanta Motor Speedway hosted the 19h round d of cup racing which saw Hometown hero tie No:9 Hendrick Motorsports Chevy Camaro ZL1 diver, Chase Elliott securing his third win of the season helping him to extend his championship lead over Ross Chastain who finished P2 in the race. The superspeedway race in the intermediate track saw the race finish in the yellow flag after Corey LaJoie who was dueling with Elliott in the final lap hit the wall.
The No:7 Spire Motorsports driver Corey LaJoie was going for his first career Cup win at the track as with just two laps to go in the final restart he lead the pack with Ross Chastain and Chase Elliott on his back. Chase Elliott was able to secure the lead in the last lap and kept the lead by aggressively blocking LaJoie, as he was running his 96th lad lap of the 260-lap race.
The yellow flag came out towards the end of the race after a desperate attempt from LaJoie to get to the land got him at the wall. Austin Cindric followed the front two in yellow flag finishing in P3 followed by Erick Jones and Ryan Blaney. Contrary to the race finishes though out this season a P09 finish by Martin Truex Jr. was the highest finish for a Toyota at the track.
Find out what Chase Elliott had to say about his win
Chase Elliott acknowledged that this win for him is of the top wins of his career as it’s a really special feeling for any race driver to win a race in their hometown. He added that he has seen a lot of drivers such as the likes of the legend Jimmie Johnson doing it in his home tracks in California and he wasn’t so far able to produce a solid race in Atlanta. He added that he had the feeling that the last Sunday was a great opportunity for him to achieve that.
“This one’s up there for sure. To win at your home track is a really big deal, I think, to any race car driver. I watched a lot of guys do it over the years — Jimmie [Johnson] out in California… We haven’t really had a very good run here, so I felt like today was a good opportunity for us,” Chase Elliott said.
He points out that he is just so proud of the win and his team as he was able to achieve such a win in his home where there were a lot of fans coming out and cheering for him to see him finishing in the victory lane saying “I’m just so proud. This is obviously home for me and home to a lot of great fans who made a lot of noise today. Couldn’t be more proud of our team,”.
Chase Elliott went on to speak about Corey LaJoie who was so close to getting a win over him in the final lap as pointed out that he knew that the spire motorsports driver gave him one real aggressive block as he understood that he could have a great run over him if he is to get the bottom lane from him. He added that he was ready to give a second block on LeJoie since he was riding his bumper but he had enough room to get ahead.
“Obviously I knew he was gonna have a big run. I didn’t want to really give him the bottom, and I tried to give it one real, good, aggressive block. I felt like I had enough room to kind of give it a second one, and he was just right there on the right side of my back bumper. So it was far enough to the backside of the bumper to launch me forward,” says Chase Elliott added.
He went on to add that he hate it when he cause some cars to tear up but he didn’t have any alternative in that situation as he is always chasing the win irrespective of the circumstances saying “I hate it tore up some cars, but I don’t know what you do. You either go for the win or don’t. I’m gonna choose Option A every day of the week,”.
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