By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service

The Charlotte Road Course has been a serendipitous track for Hendrick drivers

For Hendrick Motorsports drivers, the Charlotte Motor Speedway Road Course can be a place of good omens.

Kyle Busch, driver of the #8 Lenovo Chevrolet, and Ty Gibbs, driver of the #54 Interstate Batteries All Battery Center Toyota, lead the field during the NASCAR Cup Series Bank of America ROVAL 400 at Charlotte Motor Speedway on October 08, 2023 in Concord, North Carolina. (Photo by James Gilbert/Getty Images)

In 2020, when the 2.280-mile, 17-turn circuit hosted the sixth race in the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs, Chase Elliott won that Round of 12 elimination race and went on to win the series championship.

A year later, in his first season with Hendrick Motorsports, Kyle Larson duplicated his teammate’s feat, winning at the Roval and claiming the title with a victory in the Championship 4 event at Phoenix Raceway.

Interestingly, all four Hendrick drivers—Elliott, Larson, William Byron and Alex Bowman—are above the current cut line entering Sunday’s Bank of America Roval 400 (2 p.m. ET on NBC, PRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).

The four drivers, however, come to the newly configured road course with different agendas. Byron is the only driver to have clinched a spot in the Round of 8, a feat he accomplished on points after a third-place finish last Sunday at Talladega Superspeedway.

After matching his career-best finish (fourth) at Talladega, Larson can advance to the next round of the Playoffs by scoring 16 points on Sunday, no matter who wins the race.

Bowman is 26 points above the current cutoff and likely will try to score points in the first two stages to secure his spot in the Round of 8. Elliott is eighth in the standings, just 13 points ahead of Joey Logano in ninth, a position that may dictate a more aggressive approach to Sunday’s race.

Complicating the issue are dramatic changes to the layout. Instead of approaching the main grandstand, Turn 6 now directs the drivers toward the condominiums in Turn 1 on the NASCAR oval. It’s an uphill corner where drivers won’t be able to see the apex before they reach the braking zone.

The new Turn 7, which leads up to the banking of the oval, is a tight hairpin that Christopher Bell (second in the Playoff standings and the 2022 Roval winner) says has the potential to be a new “calamity corner.”

Turn 16, in the frontstretch chicane, has been tightened to a sharper radius.  

“I kind of look at it like it’s a new race track, truthfully,” Elliott said. “That section of the track (Turns 6 and 7) is going to change the entire flow of the lap there, so I’ve been kind of approaching it as a new track with my preparation. I’ve spent some time in the simulator, just trying to really memorize the track and where the little bumps are.

“Typically, those track scans are pretty good. I think that’s probably one of the best things about the simulator, that a driver can go and get familiar with the track layout—surface content, roughness, so on and so forth. It’s really about all I feel like I can do until we get some time on track.”

Drivers will get their first non-virtual track time on Saturday during practice, with each competitor getting 40 minutes on the new layout before qualifying.

“I was able to turn some laps on the Roval in the simulator last week,” Larson said. “The changes to the track create another passing zone (Turn 7) but could also create chaos if drivers make late moves there.

“With our finish at Talladega, we’re in a much better points position entering this race than years past, but we still have to execute and put together a solid race this weekend.”

Needing more than just a solid race are the remaining Ford drivers in the field—Logano, Austin Cindric, Chase Briscoe and Ryan Blaney. Of the four, only Blaney, the reigning series champion, remains above the current cutoff at +25.

Briscoe and Cindric are 29 and 32 points below the line, respectively, likely needing a victory on Sunday to advance.

“We kind of have to go in here with the mind-set of winning the race, which simplifies things in a lot of ways,” Cindric said. “It certainly simplifies strategy thoughts and thoughts in preparation for the race.

“It’s not the situation you want to be in, but it’s something we’re certainly prepared to go after and fight for.”

NASCAR Xfinity elimination race has all the ingredients for intense drama

It would be difficult to imagine a tighter race for the final spots in the NASCAR Xfinity Series’ Round of 8 entering Saturday’s Drive for the Cure 250 Presented by Blue Cross Blue Shield of NC at the Charlotte Motor Speedway Road Course.

Only 23 points separate seventh-place AJ Allmendinger from 12th-place Parker Kligerman as the series prepares to trim its Playoff field from 12 drivers to eight. Justin Allgaier, who entered the Playoffs as the top seed, is seven points below the cut in ninth place, followed by Shane van Gisbergen (-10), Sam Mayer (-13) and Kligerman.

Initially, all eyes will turn to Allmendinger, who is undefeated in four Xfinity starts at the 17-turn, 2.280-mile circuit, which has undergone significant changes to Turns 6, 7 and 16 since last year’s race.

“I’m always super pumped to get to the Roval,” said Allmendinger, who did not run last year’s Xfinity race but picked up his first NASCAR Cup Series win there. “The last five years we’ve made such great memories, and hopefully we can continue to make some more.

“The new layout will be a little bit different compared to what we have run in the past, so that will be a new challenge. Overall, we’re going there with the mentality to try to get as many points as possible in the stages and get the best finish we can to hopefully get us into the next round of the Playoffs.”

Allmendinger’s main competition is likely to come from his Kaulig Racing teammate, Van Gisbergen, who like Allmendinger, also is racing in the Cup series this weekend. The three-time Australian Supercars champion has three Xfinity Series road course victories this season—at Portland, Sonoma and the Chicago Street Course.

“It’s going to be a big challenge, as it’s not like anything I’ve ever driven before,” Van Gisbergen said. “The track is a hybrid, not really a road course, and the cars are compromised to run on the oval as well. Going to be a fun weekend, but also going to be tough.

“We are on the other side of the playoff cut line than we want to be on, so just want to be up there at the front and get as many points as possible, which should hopefully put us in a good position for an awesome result in my WeatherTech Chevy.”

Mayer, who won last year’s Roval Playoff race from the pole, hopes to erase his 13-point deficit. Both Sammy Smith and Chandler Smith already have clinched spots in the Round of 8, leaving six berths up for grabs on Saturday.