LONG POND, Pa. – Trackhouse Racing entered Pocono Raceway searching for momentum, and team owner Justin Marks made sure everyone knew it. In a pre-race text to team members, Marks challenged the organization to help turn its season around.
Ross Chastain responded with arguably his strongest run of the season. He earned his first top-10 finish of the season at a non-drafting track, placing eighth.
“The 1 car used to poke our lips out sad about an eighth and I’m ready to drink some Busch Light,” Chastain told Jayski, relieved to crack the top 10.
With a 24th-place qualifying effort, which led the three Trackhouse entries, Chastain knew he was going to have an uphill battle come race day. But first-year crew chief Brandon McSwain aced the strategy, continuously moving the No. 1 car up the leaderboard.
Throughout a long green-flag run to conclude Stage 2, Chastain was among the first cars to pit at Lap 75. That led to a sixth-place finish in the stage, banking a handful of points.
Having pitted early in the middle stage, Chastain was among the drivers that pitted at the stage break and needed less fuel than most drivers when pitting for the final time at Lap 135. In the closing laps, he jumped up to eighth position, his first top 10 period since Talladega Superspeedway in late April.
“We haven’t been able to pass cars and I was able to pass cars today,” Chastain added. “Tie that together with the strategy working out the way we played it to get stage points and then run deep into Stage 3 with no cautions, we were vulnerable for a while. We needed that to make lap time and we did that. Well execution, well-timed cautions when there weren’t any and a faster 1 car than we’ve had in months.”
The month of May was brutal for Chastain. Across the four points-paying races, the No. 1 bunch had a best finish of 26th at Texas Motor Speedway. He had consecutive DNFs at Charlotte Motor Speedway – a run-in with Ricky Stenhouse Jr. – and Nashville Superspeedway when a brake rotor exploded. He dropped as low as 26th in the regular-season championship standings.
Between Pocono and a 16th-place effort at Michigan International Speedway, Chastain has leaped three spots to 23rd in the standings, 61 points below the proverbial cutline with 10 races remaining until The Chase begins.
‘Oh my gosh, I’m ready to celebrate,” Chastain said of how much the result was needed. “I’ve crashed so much. I crashed in everything I’ve been in during the month of May. Justin Marks texted us this morning and was on us to get it turned around, which of course, we’re all trying to. Just glad to have the speed in the 1 car and the changes that Brandon McSwain made throughout the race and over night.”
Trackhouse’s outlook brightens over the next two weeks as NASCAR shifts to road-course racing. Shane van Gisbergen will be heavily favored at Naval Base Coronado and will have an opportunity to repeat as the winner at Sonoma Raceway.