Chase Elliott charged through the door Denny Hamlin opened on the final lap Sunday at Kansas Speedway and punched his ticket into the second round of the NASCAR Cup Series playoffs.
Bubba Wallace led the race at the white flag over Hamlin, Chase Briscoe, Christopher Bell and Elliott. Wallace cleared Bell for the lead off Turn 4, coming to the white flag in double overtime. He was still clear of the field through Turns 1 and 2, but Elliott was already in third place having restarted eighth.
In the final two corners, Hamlin ran himself and Wallace to the wall, with Wallace hitting the wall and Hamlin briefly clearing him – brief because Elliott charged on the bottom, coming into contact with a descending Hamlin off Turn 4 on his way to the finish line.
“I don’t know, man,” Elliott said. “Everything worked out perfectly for me. I had a great push through [Turns] 1 and 2; that kind of all started with the [No.] 6, and a big run off of [Turn] 2. The seas kind of parted and I was able to keep my momentum up. That was really it. We still had pretty good tires compared to those guys, but what a crazy finish. I hope y’all enjoyed that. I certainly did.
“Really proud of our team. We had a really solid weekend – win or no win. It’s really nice to qualify really well, but we’ll certainly enjoy this. This is certainly pretty cool. You just never take this stuff for granted because they’re hard to come by, and I’ve learned that hard the way. Always enjoy it. Always appreciate it.”
The race went to double overtime because of a caution for Zane Smith, whose car was sent on its side when it was run up into the wall by John Hunter Nemechek. Smith then landed on his roof, rolled over again, and eventually landed on his wheels.
Carson Hocevar spinning with eight laps to go in regulation set up the first overtime. Wallace was declared the leader over Bell when the caution for Hocevar came out. The No. 23 fought Bell off in the first overtime attempt to restart as the leader for the second.
Hamlin, meanwhile, was battling power steering issues. He swept both stages and led a race-high 150 laps, but reported the power steering issue under the lap 211 caution as he was leading. Hamlin maintained the top spot until the caution flew with 15 laps to go and sent the field down pit road.
A mistake by the jack man caused a slow stop and cost Hamlin the lead. He came off pit road seventh while Bell and Wallace took control of the race on the front row.
“Just super disappointing, obviously,” Hamlin said. “I wanted it bad. It would have been 60 (wins) for me, and the team did an amazing job with the car. It was really, really fast. They gave me everything I needed. I got the restart I needed, just couldn’t finish it there on the last corner. Got really, really tight with the [No.] 23 and … we let the [No.] 9 win.”
Bell finished third, Briscoe fourth and Wallace fell to fifth after hitting the wall. Kyle Larson finished sixth, with Tyler Reddick seventh, Brad Keselowski eighth and William Byron ninth. Shane van Gisbergen completed the top 10.
Playoff driver Ross Chastain finished 11th with reigning champion Joey Logano finishing down in 21st. Logano was collected in a crash with 51 laps to go.
