NASCAR: Chastain outduels Truex Jr. to win in Nashville

Polesitter Ross Chastain and Martin Truex Jr. battled all race long for the top spot in the Ally 400 NASCAR Cup race at Nashville Superspeedway, and it was Chastain who came out on top at the end by 0.789s in his Chevy.

Denny Hamlin was third in the other Joe Gibbs Race Toyota while last year’s winner Chase Elliott and his Hendrick Motorsports teammate Kyle Larson rounded out the top-5.

Chastain led 100 of the 300 laps.

But before hoisting his new guitar, the 30-year old Chastain had a watermelon to smash – his trademark victory celebration – a nod to his family’s multi-generation watermelon farm in rural Alva, Florida. And the sold-out Nashville crowd – home to his race team owner Justin Marks – roared with enthusiasm for the long smoke-filled victory burnout he did in front of the grandstands to his enthusiastic melon drop.

“This is incredible,” a grinning Chastain said. “This is why every little kid out there, anyone in the world, when you get criticized and you’re going to if you’re a competitor, they will try to tear you down and you’ll start believing it and you can’t do that.

“Go to your people. Trust in the process. Read your books and trust in the Big Man’s plan upstairs. And just keep getting up and going to work on it.

“A lot of self-reflection through all this, but I had a group that believed in me and they didn’t let me get down,” he said of his challenges in 2023.

Chastain certainly proved that resilience and his faith in the process. He led early Sunday and then led late – thanks to incredibly fast pit stops from his Trackhouse Racing team helping position him for the race lead on the final round of stops of the night.

It’s the first race win of 2023 for Chastain, who led the championship standings for seven weeks early in the year, and the first win of the year and first pole position ever for Trackhouse Racing.

Ultimately Chastain had to hold off Joe Gibbs Racing teammates Martin Truex Jr. and Denny Hamlin by .789-second for the win – leading a race best 99 of the 300 laps, including the final 34.

Lapped traffic was a factor for Chastain to overcome all night. He lost his early race lead to Tyler Reddick after Noah Gragson raced Chastain hard trying not to be lapped. There is a history between Gragson and Chastain, who had a physical confrontation at Kansas Speedway in early May. Reddick went on to win Stage 1 after Chastain was unable to clear Gragson easily, but Reddick – who started the race alongside Chastain on the front row – spun out on pit road on a caution shortly thereafter and ultimately was not a factor for the win.

In the closing laps – with Truex hot on his bumper – Chastain had to navigate traffic again; and again cars held him up in an effort not to get lapped.

Fortunately for Chastain, some of that traffic made things difficult for Truex as well and the “Melon Man” as Chastain is nicknamed was able to pull away some in the final 20 laps.

It was a clean race – only two short extra caution flags beyond the two scheduled Stage breaks. Reddick took his third stage win of the season in Stage 1 and Hamlin notched his fourth in Stage 2.

“I just think we had a third place car,” Hamlin said. “I thought the 19 [Truex] was a little better and obviously the 1 [Chastain] came on really strong there at the end.

“Just didn’t have quite a fast enough car to go for the win,” he added.

With his runner-up showing Truex maintained the NASCAR Cup Series championship lead, now up by 18-points on both Hendrick Motorsports’ William Byron and Chastain.

“Just needed to get the lead. Once we lost it, just too loose on the long runs, just could never get off the corner good to make a move,” Truex said, adding, “Just needed a little bit. Had a lot of speed. … overall a good night.”

The 1.33-mile Nashville oval has been a good place for Chastain. He finished runner-up in 2021 and was fifth last year. And having won his first career pole position on Saturday, he went into Sunday’s race feeling optimistic.

“I trust in my people, my family back home, the agriculture industry and all the people Justin Marks has in place,” Chastain said, adding, “It’s absolutely incredible the fight that we have.”

Chase Elliott, the 2022 Nashville winner, finished fourth, followed by his Hendrick Motorsports teammates Kyle Larson and Byron. Joe Gibbs Racing’s Christopher Bell, Legacy Motor Club’s Erik Jones, Richard Childress Racing’s Kyle Busch and Kaulig Racing’s A.J. Allmendinger – who won the Nashville NASCAR Xfinity Series race on Saturday – rounded out the Top-10.

ROSS CHASTAIN, NO. 1 WORLDWIDE EXPRESS CAMARO ZL1 – Race Winner Quote

It’s a hometown Nashville win for Trackhouse Racing, who likes to claim Music City as their hometown. What an impressive performance, Ross, by you and your group. After a rough month and a half for you and the 1 team, how is a win for a little medicine?

“Georgia watermelon, I got to tell you, this is incredible.

This is why every little kid out there anywhere in the world, when you get criticized, and you’re going to if you’re competitive, they will try to tear you down. You will start believing you can’t do it. You have to go to your people, trust in the process, read your books, trust the big man’s plan upstairs, just keep getting up and going to work. I got to tell you, a lot of self-reflection throughout all this. I had a group that believed in me and they didn’t let me get down. They bring rocket ships and I just try to point them to Victory Lane.

How did you put the criticism behind you?

“Trust in my people. My family back home. The agriculture industry, they’re always there for me.

Everybody at Trackhouse Justin Marks puts in place, Phil Surgen, on the 1 and 99. To win in Nashville is absolutely incredible. The WISE program, everybody at GM, Chevrolet.

I train with so many of my competitors, but it makes us better. Up against the best out there. For Worldwide Express Racing to sweep the weekend, get the pole, we won everything we could have with WWEX Racing. Jockey, Advent Health, the Moose. It’s absolutely incredible the fight that we have.”

I love the emotion in the burnout. You said in the middle of it, This is so much fun. Is this born out of relief or…

“That’s just a desire to win. I got to tell you, it’s just so hard at this level. It’s the best of the best. It’s where I’ve wanted to be since I was 18 years old, from studying for over 10 years just to qualify better let alone go race for a Cup race win.

Along the way, the journey, I’m so happy that my group is here, everybody that supports me. Yeah, look, it’s a Cup win. I don’t care what happened last month, the rest of my life, it’s a freaking Cup win.”

Martin Truex Jr.

You were frustrated with what the car was giving you, frustrated at one point with teammate Denny Hamlin. What needed to go differently?

MARTIN TRUEX JR.: Just needed to get the lead. Once we lost it, I probably made a bad move taking the bottom on a restart. Just too loose in the long runs. I could hang with whoever was leading. Just could never get off the corner good enough to get a move. Just lacking side bite. Overall just burning the rear tires off too much.

Just really loose at the end of the race there as well. Just needed a little bit. Got lots of speed. Just could never get the balance where it needed to be.

Without having clean air, it was difficult, so… Overall good night for our Bass Pro Tracker Toyota Camaro. Guys are doing a great job. Just that close again.

If we can keep doing this, we will be in good shape.

You came in the points lead, leaving in the points lead. Is that a net positive in terms of the weekend?

MARTIN TRUEX JR.: Especially if we gained on them. If we extended it, it’s always good. A lot of points at the end of the regular season to get that, a lot of bonus points. We’ll take all we can.

I was disappointed not to get the stage win there. We had it wrapped up until the tire got away on the 45. That’s how these things play out. We weren’t quite good enough to take the lead. That was our issue, burning the tires off too much, getting too loose in the long runs.

Race Results

POS	CAR	DRIVER	MANUF	BEHIND	LAPS
1	1	Ross Chastain		0.000	300
2	19	Martin Truex Jr.		0.789	300
3	11	Denny Hamlin		5.451	300
4	9	Chase Elliott		8.035	300
5	5	Kyle Larson		9.274	300
6	24	William Byron		10.269	300
7	20	Christopher Bell		11.870	300
8	43	Erik Jones		13.349	300
9	8	Kyle Busch		13.598	300
10	16	AJ Allmendinger		13.622	300
11	6	Brad Keselowski		16.789	300
12	99	Daniel Suarez		20.445	300
13	3	Austin Dillon		20.591	300
14	54	Ty Gibbs #		21.258	300
15	23	Bubba Wallace		23.736	300
16	41	Ryan Preece		26.250	300
17	48	Alex Bowman		28.732	300
18	17	Chris Buescher		29.073	300
19	22	Joey Logano		29.339	300
20	7	Corey LaJoie		29.936	300
21	21	Harrison Burton		30.352	300
22	47	Ricky Stenhouse Jr.		-1	299
23	31	Justin Haley		-1	299
24	4	Kevin Harvick		-1	299
25	10	Aric Almirola		-1	299
26	42	Noah Gragson #		-1	299
27	2	Austin Cindric		-1	299
28	34	Michael McDowell		-1	299
29	51	JJ Yeley(i)		-2	298
30	45	Tyler Reddick		-2	298
31	14	Chase Briscoe		-2	298
32	77	Ty Dillon		-2	298
33	15	Brennan Poole(i)		-3	297
34	78	Josh Bilicki(i)		-3	297
35	38	Todd Gilliland		-4	296
36	12	Ryan Blaney		-154	146

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