Now you can call Chase Elliott “The Bounty Hunter.”
The Dawsonville, Georgia speedster held off a late challenge from Kyle Busch to score the victory in Tuesday night’s NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series race at Charlotte Motor Speedway.
Elliott nabbed the win just six days after a dust-up between him and Busch in the final moments of the NASCAR Cup Series race at Darlington Raceway on May 20. That ended with Elliott crashing on the front stretch wall.
Tuesday’s Truck Series race instead ended with Elliott turning on the “si-reen” on top of the famed Dawsonville Pool Room for the first time in 2020.
It also snaps a seven race series win streak for Busch.
“He’s really good at anything he does, so I enjoyed just to have a chance to race against him,” said Elliott. “Like I said there on TV, I was glad that I had a chance to race him for the win instead of him finishing 10th or having a problem or one of us having a messed up night.
“For us to be able to go head-to-head for the win like that I thought was really cool and certainly felt good to come out on top.”
The win came in Elliott’s first series start in three years. It also means a $100,000 bonus in the form of a bounty for a Cup driver to defeat Busch in the Truck Series, put up by Kevin Harvick and Marcis Lemonis, the CEO of Gander Outdoors.
The money will go for COVID-19 relief.
Elliott even stole Busch’s post-win tradition by taking a bow with the checkered flag on the finish line.
“It was a spur of the moment thing,” Elliott said. “I thought we’ve had so much fun with this with Kevin (Harvick) and putting up the money and Kyle is a good sport about it, I hope. But just having fun, man. It’s not a dig at anybody, but just having fun with it. It was about beating him, and we did it, so why not have some fun with it.”
Elliott took up the challenge when it was first announced in March, with the notion of racing for it at Atlanta Motor Speedway driving for GMS Racing. But when the COVID-19 shutdown put the AMS event on hold, the Charlotte event became the next best spot for Elliott to pilot the No. 24 Chevy Silverado.
“For me, I was more in it for the challenge more than anything,” said Elliott. “I was in it just to try to come out and try to run with Kyle and gain some more practice, and I enjoyed that. It was fun, I enjoyed it, and tonight certainly was rewarding in a lot of ways, but it no way fixes the last two races on the Cup side. Those races are really important for my everyday life, and to have two of them end the way they did, this doesn’t fix that but it certainly feels good.”
Busch, who finished in second, said he didn’t see Elliott take the post-race bow.
“No, it’s the first I’m hearing about it,” said Busch. “Imitation is the strongest form of flattery or something, I don’t know what it is. That’s cute.”
Busch said there were problems with his No. 51 Toyota from the start.
“It doesn’t help showing up to the race track with broke parts on your truck,” he said. “That was a problem from the get-go. Didn’t have our right-front stopper right so we were all over the splitter. We came in and didn’t know it was broke so had to fix it with a make shift piece and it was way too high. Then we tried to fix it and just never was right. We were out in left field the whole night. Never really had a great feel for the truck or a great driving truck. Just salvaged what I could.”
Elliott took the lead for the final time when he bypassed Johnny Sauter with 23 laps to go. Busch battled behind him with Sauter and rookie Zane Smith for the runner-up spot. Busch finally moved to second two laps later, and tried to catch Elliott.
At one point, Busch had closed the gap down to about two tenths of a second. Over the final laps, Elliott pulled out to an advantage of just over half a second en route to the win.
It marks the third career series win for Elliott, with the last one coming in his previous start at Martinsville Speedway in 2017.
So does that mean we’ll see him in the Truck series with more regularity?
“Well, it was about beating Kyle and we did that, so I guess I can quit now,” Elliott said.
The first two segments of the race ran mostly clean, seeing just one on-track caution fly. Ross Chastain won the first segment, with Elliott taking the second.
The third segment saw an increase in intensity, with the race being interrupted four times by caution flags, including one on lap 80 that occurred when Stewart Friesen made contact with the slower truck of Jesse Iwuji, gathering up Brennan Poole in the process.
The final caution of the night flew when the truck of Peachtree City, Georgia’s Garrett Smithley spun into the inside wall on the backstretch on lap 102, setting up the final run to the checkered flag.
Smith finished in third, with Brett Moffitt in fourth and Sheldon Creed in fifth.
John Hunter Nemechek, Sauter, Ty Majeski, Winston, Georgia’s Austin Hill and Ben Rhodes rounded out the top 10.
NASCAR Gander RV & Outdoors Truck Series
Charlotte Motor Speedway – Concord, NC
North Carolina Education Lottery 200 – May 26, 2020
1. (26) Chase Elliott(i), Chevrolet, 134.
2. (16) Kyle Busch(i), Toyota, 134.
3. (30) Zane Smith #, Chevrolet, 134.
4. (22) Brett Moffitt, Chevrolet, 134.
5. (21) Sheldon Creed, Chevrolet, 134.
6. (38) John Hunter Nemechek(i), Ford, 134.
7. (8) Johnny Sauter, Ford, 134.
8. (7) Ty Majeski #, Chevrolet, 134.
9. (5) Austin Hill, Toyota, 134.
10. (1) Ben Rhodes, Ford, 134.
11. (27) Ross Chastain(i), Chevrolet, 134.
12. (9) Grant Enfinger, Ford, 134.
13. (2) Tyler Ankrum, Chevrolet, 134.
14. (6) Christian Eckes #, Toyota, 134.
15. (20) Raphael Lessard #, Toyota, 134.
16. (25) Derek Kraus #, Toyota, 134.
17. (17) Tate Fogleman #, Chevrolet, 134.
18. (31) Codie Rohrbaugh, Chevrolet, 134.
19. (15) Austin Wayne Self, Chevrolet, 134.
20. (35) Jesse Little(i), Chevrolet, 134.
21. (3) Tanner Gray #, Ford, 134.
22. (33) Timmy Hill, Chevrolet, 134.
23. (12) Angela Ruch, Toyota, 133.
24. (34) Korbin Forrister, Toyota, 133.
25. (19) Spencer Boyd, Chevrolet, 133.
26. (29) Jennifer Jo Cobb, Chevrolet, 133.
27. (13) Natalie Decker, Chevrolet, 132.
28. (40) Bayley Currey(i), Chevrolet, 132.
29. (39) Clay Greenfield, Toyota, 130.
30. (10) Stewart Friesen, Toyota, 130.
31. (18) Jordan Anderson, Chevrolet, 130.
32. (23) Cory Roper, Ford, 129.
33. (37) T.J. Bell, Chevrolet, 127.
34. (36) Bryan Dauzat, Chevrolet, 120.
35. (4) Matt Crafton, Ford, 107.
36. (24) Garrett Smithley(i), Chevrolet, Rear End, 105.
37. (11) Todd Gilliland, Ford, Accident, 102.
38. (32) Brennan Poole(i), Toyota, DVP, 83.
39. (14) Jesse Iwuji, Toyota, Accident, 74.
40. (28) Spencer Davis #, Toyota, Transmission, 54.
Average Speed of Race Winner: 111.978 mph.
Time of Race: 1 Hrs, 47 Mins, 42 Secs. Margin of Victory: 0.627 Seconds.
Caution Flags: 7 for 37 laps.
Lead Changes: 19 among 10 drivers.
Lap Leaders: B. Rhodes 0;A. Hill 1-19;M. Crafton 20;A. Hill 21-26;R. Chastain(i) 27-32;Z. Smith # 33-36;R. Lessard # 37-38;M. Crafton 39-43;C. Elliott(i) 44-63;B. Rhodes 64;C. Elliott(i) 65-67;B. Rhodes 68;K. Busch(i) 69-86;B. Moffitt 87-88;K. Busch(i) 89-92;A. Hill 93;K. Busch(i) 94-96;Z. Smith # 97-107;J. Sauter 108-110;C. Elliott(i) 111-134.
Leaders Summary: (Driver, Times Lead, Laps Led) Chase Elliott(i) 3 times for 47 laps; Austin Hill 3 times for 26 laps; Kyle Busch(i) 3 times for 25 laps; Zane Smith # 2 times for 15 laps; Matt Crafton 2 times for 6 laps; Ross Chastain(i) 1 time for 6 laps; Johnny Sauter 1 time for 3 laps; Ben Rhodes 2 times for 2 laps; Brett Moffitt 1 time for 2 laps; Raphael Lessard # 1 time for 2 laps.
Stage #1 Top Ten: 42,16,21,88,45,24,38,99,26,23
Stage #2 Top Ten: 24,99,8,88,51,23,21,38,42,16
Top 10 in Points: 1. Austin Hill – 120; 2. Johnny Sauter – 103; 3. Zane Smith – 103; 4. Ben Rhodes – 99; 5. Brett Moffitt – 98; 6. Sheldon Creed – 90; 7. Grant Enfinger – 81 (1 Win); 8. Christian Eckes – 78; 9. Tyler Ankrum – 76; 10. Codie Rohrbaugh – 72.
