Although his Daytona 500 didn’t unfold the way he drew it up, Chase Elliott was still in the hunt until the final corner, before a wreck sparked by Riley Herbst wiped out both him and Brad Keselowski. Now, he is ready to turn the page and set his sights on a third Cup Series win at his home track.
The pieces also seem to be falling into place. Rain washed out qualifying, pushing the metric to set the grid. By that math, Elliott will start from row two. Besides that, the Hendrick Motorsportsdriver also has an average finish of 11.4 across 13 starts and 9.14 since the overhaul of Atlanta Motor Speedway in 2021, numbers that make him the favorite of those entering the race on Sunday.
Advertisement
Elliott is also leaning into the challenge, even with the new Chevrolet body making its Cup debut last week. Speaking ahead of Sunday’s race at Atlanta, he said per Speedway Media, “I thought we had a really, a really good week all the way up to the DAYTONA 500, from a balanced standpoint.
“Throughout the race, I thought there were some things that we could improve upon.”
“So, certainly, I think we challenged all of our guys to try and find a little bit that we could use to make some of those things better for this week,” he continued. “But there were some high spots. Whichever side of that scenario you were on, whether you were getting pushed or doing the pushing, I thought that we did a better job of that more efficiently, which has been an area of emphasis that we wanted to improve with this new body change.”
“I think from now, it’s just like, okay, how do we fine-tune our balances and get everything exactly like we want… So, hopefully we can continue to process all those small details and just make it a bit better, which I think we will,” he added.
Advertisement
The new Chevy body brings a larger hood dome, a reworked front grille, and reshaped side panels. The shift is intended to move the needle on track and iron out issues from last season, with teams digging into the nuts and bolts as they chase gains.
Elliott believes the focus for his camp has been the skills of pushing and being pushed, a craft that pays dividends on drafting tracks. Even on the final lap at Daytona, he surged into the fight due to a push from Zane Smith, who locked onto the rear of the No. 9 and drove him forward. And Elliott plans to build on that rhythm, knowing that at Atlanta, timing and trust can turn a run into a trip to Victory Lane.
The post Chase Elliott Confident of His Chances at Atlanta After Chevrolet’s New Body Shows Promise appeared first on The SportsRush.
