Elliott, looking for his second series championship in three seasons this weekend at Phoenix Raceway, had a first-hand view of Chastain’s move, which he says raises many questions.
Desperate to make up positions on the final lap of last Sunday’s race at Martinsville, Chastain entered Turn 3 full-throttle and deliberately drove into the SAFER barrier to rim-ride Turns 3 and 4, letting go of the steering wheel at one point.
He was so fast he earned five positions in two turns which allowed him to edge Denny Hamlin for the final spot in the Championship 4.
While the right-side of Chastain’s No. 1 Chevrolet suffered some damage, he still registered a final lap of 18.845 seconds. The fastest previous lap in the race was set on Lap 7 of 500 by Kyle Larson (20.508 seconds).
“It’s certainly commendable for a guy to do what he had to do to get the job done. I totally respect that and I think that deserves some respect,” Elliott said. “From the global landscape of our sport, when you kind of step back and look at it, I think it is a bit embarrassing really.
“NASCAR has put a lot of time and effort into making these cars equal. We’re suspending crew chiefs for weeks for pieces of vinyl being in the wrong place. Then you go break the track record and run two seconds faster than everybody, it’s just like from an integrity standpoint of what we do, is that proper?
“I don’t know, maybe it’s not for me to say. It certainly is interesting. At the end of the day, I don’t personally care. I just want to be in a position to be out front and far enough from everybody where it doesn’t matter.”
Within the rules
NASCAR said this week the move “was within the rules” and would not make any changes for this weekend’s championship races at Phoenix. It will review the matter in the offseason, however.
When it comes to whether he thinks NASCAR should ban the practice, Elliott said that was a difficult question for him to answer.
“It’s a tough one. I think we have a lot of rules as it exists today and I’m certainly not an advocate of having more rules I don’t think,” he said. “I think they ride a very fine line of entertainment value. The line of entertainment and integrity – that’s a really difficult one to balance.
“With all the retweets and likes and favorites (on social media) they’ve gotten on all the stuff this week, unfortunately I think that’s driven it a little bit too much.
“Whether people like it or not should not be involved in the decision-making process of what is right or wrong, in my opinion, for a governing body.”
