Chase Elliott will begin eighth for the Spherical of 8 finale on the Martinsville Speedway, a must-win race for the 29-year-old if he intends to make it to the championship 4 in Phoenix. With a sword hanging on his neck on the sub-one-mile observe, it poses as his largest take a look at but.
Elliott is without doubt one of the few racers to have received a race within the NASCAR postseason. He received the Hollywood On line casino 400 and showcased that he nonetheless has the grit in him to make it to Phoenix as a championship contender.
However, for the reason that Spherical of 8 started, his luck has seemingly taken a step again as he completed 18th on the Las Vegas Motor Speedway and solely accomplished 51 laps of the Talladega earlier than being dominated out of the race. This leaves him a large 62 factors beneath the cutline.
With the hole being insurmountable, even when his rivals have their profession’s worst race ever, Chase Elliott has just one approach to get out of this maze, i.e., by means of a win at Martinsville. Although the HM driver has received at Martinsville in comparable do-or-die circumstances in 2020, which laid down his path for a win in Phoenix, this time the problem is a bit completely different.
Arriving at Martinsville, he’s on one of many worst streaks of ends in his profession. His HM stablemates are additionally within the combine, as William Byron and Kyle Larson need to cement their place within the championship 4.
This riles up the duty to make it into the cutline, and with no possibility apart from to win, Elliott faces a troublesome problem to beat all odds and make his bid to enter the ultimate 4.
Chase Elliott is able to tackle the do-or-die race on the Martinsville Speedway


Successful a must-win race just isn’t for everyone, and Chase Elliott has expertise in doing so. Many would possibly suppose that the strain would possibly get to the 2020 Cup Sequence champion, however the Dawsonville-born driver thinks in any other case.
The 29-year-old was gushing with pleasure and mentioned forward of the race weekend (through NBC Sports activities):
“I’m tremendous enthusiastic about it. This weekend is simply numerous enjoyable, actually, from my perspective, whether or not we’re 10 factors out, 30 factors out, 150 factors out. I don’t care. I’m wanting ahead to it… I feel it is a good alternative to maintain issues actually easy for us. Exit and carry out at as excessive a degree as we are able to. Assume we’re very succesful, and I sit up for no matter (Sunday) brings.”
Aside from Elliott, common season champion William Byron, reigning Cup Sequence champion Joey Logano, and Ryan Blaney are additionally beneath the cutline heading into the Xfinity 500.
Edited by Geetansh Pasricha