Chase Elliott cruised to victory by a large 3.8-second margin over Joey Logano in the Bank of America Roval 400 at Charlotte Motor Speedway on Sunday. The win was Elliott's third of 2020 and ninth of his career. The Dawsonville, GA native has now won two straight races on the Charlotte Roval.
"Road courses have been fortunate to us...we just try to get a little better every time," Elliott said, during his post-race interview. "It's always special to win here at Charlotte with the shop being right across the street."
Sunday's win was also Elliott's fourth consecutive road course victory, tying Cup Series Hall-of-Famer Jeff Gordon.
"We all respect his career," Elliott said when mentioning the now-retired Gordon. "Jeff is a four-time champion and we don't remember him for his four road course victories in a row."
Erik Jones finished third, his third top-three finish in the last four races, Kurt Busch fourth, and Ryan Blaney fifth. William Byron, Martin Truex Jr, Alex Bowman, Cole Custer, and Clint Bowyer rounded out the top 10.
Jimmie Johnson finished 13th in his final race at Charlotte Motor Speedway where he has won eight times.
Rain was in the forecast for the majority of the race but ended up not being a major factor. During the race's lap 12 competition caution, Ty Dillon, of the number 13 Chevy, chose to pit for regular, slick tires while most of the field put rain tires on their cars. Since no rain fell, however, Dillon's strategic decision paid off. The Welcome, NC native drove to the front of the field which resulted in him capturing the Stage One victory, his first stage win of the season. Blaney, the inaugural Charlotte Roval winner two years ago, won Stage Two.
The Bank of America Roval 400 served as the cutoff race for the Round of 12, which resulted in four drivers being eliminated from championship contention.
Those four drivers were Clint Bowyer, Austin Dillon, Aric Almirola, and defending Cup Series champion Kyle Busch. Busch took the lead on lap 90 after choosing to stay on the race track while most of the field pitted under the race's eighth caution. Busch ended up pitting with two laps to go, while running seventh, after going 43 laps without making a pit stop.
"It's been a terrible year for me," the Las Vegas native said. "I knew this (playoff) round was gonna be trouble with the year that we've had. We've still got a lot of work to do to get better, I'm not sure what it is."
Busch finished the race 30th, extending his winless streak to 32 races.
The Cup Series begins the Round of 8 this Sunday at Kansas Speedway, one of the more competitive intermediate tracks on the NASCAR circuit. Denny Hamlin has won the last two Kansas races, including the 400-miler in July. The Hollywood Casino 400 starts at 2:30 p.m. this Sunday on NBC.
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