{"id":22490,"date":"2018-10-22T15:33:44","date_gmt":"2018-10-22T20:33:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/?p=22490"},"modified":"2018-10-28T16:59:26","modified_gmt":"2018-10-28T21:59:26","slug":"chase-elliott-proves-himself-as-a-title-contender-with-win-at-kansas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/2018\/10\/22\/chase-elliott-proves-himself-as-a-title-contender-with-win-at-kansas\/","title":{"rendered":"Chase Elliott proves himself as a title contender with win at Kansas"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Holly Cain, NASCAR Wire Service<\/em><\/p>\n

There were many who believed that once Chase Elliott<\/strong> got his first Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series<\/a> win, more would follow. Rapidly.<\/p>\n

\"\"

Chase Elliott, driver of the #9 NAPA Auto Parts Chevrolet, poses with the winner’s decal in Victory Lane after winning the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Gander Outdoors 400 at Dover International Speedway on October 7, 2018 in Dover, Delaware. (Photo by Brian Lawdermilk\/Getty Images)<\/p><\/div>\n

And they were right.<\/p>\n

Sure enough, with Elliott securing his second Playoff win \u2013 and third victory of the season – at Kansas Speedway on Sunday afternoon, the crowd favorite 22-year old is proving himself a very viable force to be reckoned with. And his timing couldn\u2019t be better with only four races remaining in the Cup championship hunt.<\/p>\n

\u201cI felt like as a team we were capable of winning and doing it often,\u2019\u2019 Elliott said after celebrating his win in victory lane. \u201cI felt like I believed in my ability to do so. I believed in my team\u2019s ability, [crew chief] Alan\u2019s [Gustafson] ability, our pit crew, road crew, the whole deal. That\u2019s never really been a question mark in my mind.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe started the year and we were pretty bad. I felt like pretty off on speed, struggling with handling, trying to get our cars better. I think we\u2019ve been better. I don\u2019t think we are where we want to be, where we need to be, but I think we\u2019re better.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think the performance on track has put us in positions to capitalize. That\u2019s been the difference. We\u2019ve just been in position more often. If you can keep putting yourself in position, I think those are great places to be.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n

As is often the case among elite drivers, scoring that first victory is the hard part. But as Elliott has demonstrated, the lift it gives both driver and team is immediate and beneficial. Elliott is averaging a 10.1 place finish in the 11 races since his first win at Watkins Glen, N.Y. this summer. He was averaging a 13.6 place finish in the 21 races before that.<\/p>\n

Since that win he has eight top-10 finishes in 11 races, five top-fives and two more victories \u2013 both in the Playoffs. In fact his two Playoff wins are the most in the series and he is now ranked fourth in the standings behind only the season\u2019s \u201cBig 3\u201d \u2013 Kevin Harvick, Kyle Busch and Martin Truex Jr.<\/p>\n

And Elliott has absolutely held his own against those veterans \u2013 all three previous Cup champions.<\/p>\n

Taking out the Talladega restrictor plate Playoff race, only the defending Cup champion Truex is averaging a better finish (8.0) in the other opening five Playoff races than Elliott (9.6). Championship points leader Busch is averaging a 10.0 place finish in the five races other than Talladega. Harvick is averaging 11.4.<\/p>\n

However, Busch and Harvick are both a series best seven-time winners in 2018. And Truex has won four times.<\/p>\n

Still, for all his impressive late season work Elliott insisted Sunday that he feels just as much championship ready now as he did at the beginning of the season.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe difference has been going through some tougher days, having some learning experiences, making our cars faster, having those learning experiences along with making our car better has meant better results,\u2019\u2019 Elliott said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think we have just as good a shot as anybody and that\u2019s our approach these next three weeks.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n

Up next are races this week at the Martinsville, Va. short track this Sunday, then on to the Texas Motor Speedway 1.5-miler on Nov. 4. The final four championship eligible drivers will be decided after the Nov. 11 Can-Am 500 at Phoenix and they will vie for the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series trophy at Homestead-Miami Speedway on Nov. 18.<\/p>\n

Elliott is guardedly optimistic about the upcoming venues. He won his first ever Xfinity Series race at Texas in 2014 en route to claiming the championship, but he said Sunday it is the most challenging of the three tracks to settle the Final Four.<\/p>\n

He has led 143 laps total in two of the last three Martinsville Speedway races and has a pair of top-10 finishes in that span. He was ninth this spring and third last spring. At Phoenix, he has four top-10s in five starts. His worse showing was 12th<\/sup> in spring, 2017. He was runner-up in the Playoff race there last year.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think my team in particular does a great job of just really paying attention to every detail they can, especially at this time of year,\u2019\u2019 Elliott said. \u201cI give a lot of credit, in my opinion, for picking up performance these last few weeks to Alan [Gustafson].<\/p>\n

\u201cI gave him the same credit as last year when we picked up the performance. We had a great run last year. I know it doesn\u2019t seem like it. We had a lot of second place finishes, an opportunity to win a couple of those races that would have put is in a similar position to what we\u2019re in right now.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat confidence and ability to do that, in my opinion, has been there when things are going for us, when on-track performance is there.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe just need to keep putting ourselves in the position we were in today, running inside the top three, try to be battling, contending for the race lead. I think opportunities will be there to move forward.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Holly Cain, NASCAR Wire Service There were many who believed that once Chase Elliott got his first Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series win, more would follow. Rapidly. And they were right. Sure enough, with Elliott securing his second Playoff win \u2013 and third victory of the season – at Kansas Speedway on Sunday afternoon, the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":676,"featured_media":22256,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[11],"tags":[500,16],"class_list":["post-22490","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nascar","tag-chase-elliott","tag-nascar"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/racedaysa.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/MENCS_WinnerSticker.jpg?fit=4451%2C3081","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7hzTZ-5QK","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22490","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/676"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22490"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22490\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22492,"href":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22490\/revisions\/22492"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22256"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22490"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22490"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22490"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}