2020 Cup Series champion, Chase Elliott recently responded to Ryan Blaney's sarcastic compliment before the second race of the Round of 12 at Talladega Superspeedway.
Elliott was born in Dawsonville, Georgia and is the son of 1988 Winston Cup Series champion Bill Elliott. The Hendrick Mortorsports driver has been racing full-time in the Cup Series since 2016 and became the youngest to win the NASCAR Xfinity Series championship in 2014.
After Blaney's sarcastic comments about Elliott being “Dawsonville’s finest" at the Talladega media center, Reporter Bob Pockrass asked Elliott whether he or his dad, Bill Elliott, deserved the title. Chase responded with a laugh and said,
“I'm definitely not. I'm not sure he is either. There’s got to be better than us somewhere."
Elliott is a two-time winner at Talladega and has scored 31 more points at the track than any other driver in the NASCAR Cup Series since 2022 at the 2.66-mile track.
Ahead of the YellaWood 500 race, the 28-year-old is four points above the elimination line.
"Hate to see him go" - Chase Elliott on Stewart-Haas Racing departure
Chase Elliott also commented on Stewart-Haas Racing as the team will leave the Cup Series after this season. Ahead of the race at Talladega, the 9 Chevrolet Camaro driver said he has always respected and admired Tony Stewart.
"I’ve always gotten along really well with him and looked up to him as a kid when I was watching him race. So I think that kind of skews my opinion a little bit. When Tony joined, it seemed like that was when things really ramped up and improved. At that point, it was really impressive to watch because there weren’t a lot of driver-owners that had success in the sport—very few," Elliott said.
He finds it impressive that Stewart achieved success with his race team and expressed sadness at the departure of such a strong team from the sport.
"I always thought it was really cool that he went out and did that; had success with it and made it work. So, yeah, you hate to see him go just because I think the overall health of our sport wants and needs healthy race teams, and they’ve been a healthy race team," he added.
Meanwhile, just six races are left in the NASCAR Cup Series playoffs this season. Elliott is in a close battle for the championship title with Kyle Larson who is currently leading by one point.
The upcoming race will start at 2 pm ET on NBC, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, and the NBC Sports App.