Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Elliott blows engine in opening minutes of playoff practice
MARTINSVILLE, Va. — Chase Elliott had just one plan after his engine failed in the opening minutes of practice for the playoff race Sunday at Martinsville Speedway.
“It’s pretty simple, we need to try to win,” NASCAR’s most popular driver said.
The engine made by Hendrick Motorsports failed just five laps in to the first of Saturday’s two practice sessions for the opening race in the third round of NASCAR’s playoffs. Elliott was pragmatic as the No. 9 team made the engine change that will send him to the back at the start of today’s race.
Elliott is now susceptible to dropping a lap down at
NASCAR’s shortest track if his Chevrolet is not perfect at the start. The paperclip-shaped 0.526-mile oval takes under 20 seconds per lap, and the leaders could be on Elliott’s bumper in no time.
“We broke a motor there, five laps in, and yeah, unfortunate way to start the day and it is what it is at this point,” Elliott said. “Starting in the back will be unfortunate in the first stage, but there’s nothing I can do now.”
Elliott completed 58 laps in the second and final practice session before Saturday afternoon qualifying, then later redeemed his day by qualifying second behind Denny Hamlin. Although Elliott will forfeit that starting positon, he still
got second choice of pit stall and that positioning should aid his efforts to salvage a strong finish.
The round of eight began with strategical changes from Team Penske, which swapped the over-the-wall pit crews for contender Ryan Blaney and Brad Keselowski, who was eliminated last week. The jackman from Blaney’s crew went to reigning series champion Joey Logano. The jackman was part of Logano’s race-winning, championship-clinching team at Homestead-Miami Speedway last year.
“We had a rookie jackman this year who has made a lot of good gains over this season, but I feel the opportunity to put basically the same team together that won the championship last year for the next few races, I think was a smart play,” Logano said. “We definitely needed some speed from the pit crew side of things and putting the band back together from where it was last year when we won the championship makes sense, so I was on board with that.”