DARLINGTON, S.C. – Ross Chastain showed humility and grace on Saturday at Darlington Raceway despite a painful ending to the strongest NASCAR Xfinity Series showing of his career.
Chastain, who won the pole and led a race-high 90 of 147 laps in the Sport Clips Haircuts VFW 200, appeared to be on his way to victory after winning the first two stages, proving his prowess by re-passing Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series regular Kevin Harvick for the lead on a mid-race restart after Harvick had done the same thing to him earlier on in the day.
However, the torrid battle between the two came to a head with 37 to go, when they went three-wide underneath the lap car of Timmy Hill, who relieved Chad Finchum in the No. 40 Chevrolet.
Harvick and Chastain got clear of Hill, but the close quarters and contact between the two as Chastain tried to pinch Harvick down sent both cars sliding up the race track, with Harvick slamming into Chastain’s left-side door and Chastain pancaking the right side of his car against the outside wall.
As they slid down the backstretch, Chastain’s car turned off the wall and shot back down the track, where he made contact with Harvick’s right-rear quarter panel and sent Harvick spinning in a cloud of smoke.
Though Chastain was able to continue, his car was damaged enough to warrant a lengthy stay on pit road, ultimately relegating the Florida watermelon farmer to 25th in the final results, two laps down.
It was a disheartening end to a day that showed more promise than Chastain had ever experienced in his career. He sat on the pole, won the first two stages and led more laps in one race than he had led in his entire NASCAR career prior to Saturday afternoon.
Ultimately, it was those positives that Chastain chose to reflect on after climbing from his battered car at the end of the race, rather than the negatives of missing out on what might have been a breakthrough victory.
“I’m so humbled by all of this. I can’t thank all the folks at Chip Ganassi Racing enough, because this kind of an opportunity is once in a lifetime,” said Chastain. “I was trying to race with these (front-running) guys and felt like I was holding my own. I learned a lot on the restarts from them and was really happy to be racing with them up to the point we crashed.
“Our DC Solar Chevy was really fast. It’s so crazy how much fun that car was to drive,” Chastain continued. “To try and run the wall like Kyle (Larson) does … I couldn’t get all the way there, but I tried my best to run it like he would have. I still feel like I have a long way to go, but I’m so thankful for the opportunity I have here and blessed to run like we did all afternoon long.”
