Chase Elliott Is Heating Up Early

Across much of his 11-year NASCAR Cup Series career, Chase Elliott has been a relatively slow starter.

In 2020, his championship season, Elliott totaled five wins but won only one of the schedule’s first 22 races.

He also had five wins in 2022 but waited until May at Dover to get his first. He won twice last season, the first of twin wins coming in June at Atlanta.

This year? Elliott is steppin’ out early. Sunday’s win at Texas was his second of the season, already matching his total victory production last season. He has four top 10s in the past five races. Entering Sunday’s race at Watkins Glen, he sits third in points.

“We’ve never won a race this early, much less to now have two this early in the year I think is really—I’m really proud of that, and I’m proud of our team for that, because anytime you can check off new boxes in this sport when you’ve been doing it for 10-plus years is cool, and it’s hard to do,” Elliott said.

Although he ran a superb race Sunday and benefitted from a high-level performance from his pit crew, Elliott emphasized that day-to-day work at the Hendrick Motorsports shop near Charlotte Motor Speedway is a big factor in his strong early-season push.

“I don’t know that a lot of people understand just how important that is to the overall performance, but it is a huge piece,” he said. “Really fortunate and proud of everybody at Hendrick Motorsports for their continued efforts to just dig in.

“We have a gritty group back home that they just don’t take no for an answer. They’ll just work and work and work. Whatever has got to be done, get done. Friday, Saturday, midnight, 2:00, whatever. They want to win, and boss wants to win, and we’ll do whatever we got to do to try our best for that.”

The No. 9 team’s search for win No. 3 opens with Sunday’s 100-lap race at the Glen, where Elliott has sent mixed messages.

Elliott has won seven road-course races, good for third on the all-time list, and he has two wins at Watkins Glen. He is tied with Christopher Bell for most top-five road-course finishes in the Next Gen car, but none of his seven road-course wins were scored in the Next Gen era.

Elliott has failed to lead a lap in the past three races at the Glen, and his best finish over that period is a 19th in 2024.

On the plus side, Elliott’s 7.56-second win at the Glen in 2018 is the third biggest margin of victory at the New York course. Only Rusty Wallace (1987) and current road-course superstar Shane van Gisbergen (2025) own bigger wins.

Additionally, Hendrick Motorsports drivers have won five of the past seven races at Watkins Glen—two by Elliott, two by Kyle Larson, and one by William Byron.