Chase Elliott wins high-stakes, consequential Atlanta race

This changes everything.

It’s a classic NASCAR idiom but it held a tremendous amount of merit following the Lap 69 melee that raptured 18 drivers from contention. When the literal dust settled on that crash, there were only two drivers on the lead lap that had even won a race this season in road course specialist Shane Van Gisbergen and an injured Kyle Larson.

In other words, the Quaker State 400 at Atlanta Motor Speedway all but guaranteed a new winner.

Thus began a mad scramble, with a vast majority of the remaining drivers poised to seize the opportunity and win their way into guaranteed spot in the playoffs or those on the bubble who could also do so while removing all doubt.

Think no further than the finish of the race.

Brad Keselowski entered this race 30th in the championship and only a victory would reshape the narrative of a season of missed opportunities to date. Ricky Stenhouse Jr. had had a pretty misfortunate month, circumstances largely out of his control and twice related to Carson Hocevar removed him from a provisional playoff spot, but a win would have rendered that moot. Ditto the likes of Zane Smith and Erik Jones.

They each had a shot and winning that race would have spelled bad news for even those currently inside a playoff spot on points because there are still three road course races and Daytona remaining. SVG at Mexico City or even Harrison Burton last year at Daytona is a case study for why these are wild card races.

So, Chase Elliott, Tyler Reddick, Alex Bowman, Chris Buescher and Ryan Preece all had equal reasons to win that race even while they remain in the mix based on their season consistency.

The stakes were high and the convergence of each of those narrative consequences made for a compelling finish.

To put into words what the video didn't spell out explicitly, of the 46 overall lead changes in this race, six came inside of the final 10 laps amongst those who needed this win the most.

“Certainly, the numbers were not in my favor at that point,” Elliott said of the final restarts. “I knew that and Alex did too. It was him and me against (Buescher) and (Keselowski) – both great speedway racers and they were doing a really good job controlling the race.

“It was difficult for me to get any sort of control because I felt like they were always making a run at me anytime I got the lead. I didn’t know how to defend that. I was just hoping Alex could get in the middle of that and give one of us a shot.”

As it turns out, that’s exactly what happened because Keselowski lost his help over both restarts.

He said he just needed a teammate at the end.

“The 9 just had the 48 behind him giving him a huge push and there was nothing I could do to cover that,” Keselowski said. “When had our cars linked up at RFK we could do the same thing, but we lost that and it was just kind of a two-on-one and I fought as hard as I could.”

Elliott said ‘all the cards fell right’ for him to be the one that emerged victorious.

“Got two for one there, getting into (Turn) 1, got to second, somehow Alex got to third,” Elliott said. “And, you know, at that point, I think whether me or him was getting the push, if we don’t push, we’re handing the race to Brad right? So he did me a huge solid giving me a big shove and it was enough to get by Brad and finish it off.”

Again, you'll note the absence of Keselowski on the above list because he needed to win.

"I don't think about that," Keselowski said. "I just want to win."

Ditto, Stenhouse. 

“It was going to take some big blocks to hold the lead and I just thought it was better to fall back to third and see if I could make another run and we just didn’t have enough at the end,” Stenhouse said. “And really, after the past few weeks we just needed a positive night like this.”

And even though Elliott didn't need this win in literally sense, his first win of the year was also something he practically needed. 

After all, it had been 44 races since his last trip to Victory Lane. 

“A large part of this is a testament to Alan (Gustafson, crew chief) and our relationship together,” Elliott said. “A large part of our group has been together since I got here and worked together for 10 years now, just some smaller changes here and there. …

“But when you’ve climbed to the mountaintop with someone, that’s an incredible achievement and something we will always cherish that we did it together. We haven’t climbed that mountaintop again like we want and we’ve fallen off it a couple times but it’s really important to me to keep trying to climb that mountain with the same people and know that we never quit on each other.”

Over his various slumps over the years, winless droughts and whatnot, Elliott fans frequently call for Gustafson to be reassigned and Elliott just doesn’t have an interest in entertaining that narrative.

“I’m not even sure that this would feel the same if like we all jumped ship,” Elliott said. “I’m really proud of our cars for not doing that, for showing up every week and having great attitudes and doing everything in their power to put the car and product on the race track they do.

“The effort from the guys over the wall and Alan’s intensity and calling races to meetings, getting everything out of us,” Elliott said. “It’s all right there. We have such a good group, a talented group and you just don’t quit on that.”

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