Skip to main content
Join Now
NASCAR Logo

Chase Elliott fumes at Bubba Wallace for mirror driving at Bristol

Nick Profile Picby:Nick Geddes•04/13/25•

NickGeddesNews

Chase Elliott
Mark J. Rebilas-Imagn Images

Chase Elliott and Bubba Wallace are friendly off the racetrack. But on the racetrack — during Sunday’s Food City 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway — Elliott has a problem with Wallace.

Elliott and Wallace have been racing alongside each other throughout Stage 2. Elliott accused Wallace of mirror driving him and it’s not the first time, he said over his radio.

“The damn 23 [Wallace] mirror drives us every week,” Elliott said, via Brett Winningham of Speedway Digest.

Elliott has had his issues with other drivers this season. At COTA and in last Saturday’s Xfinity Series race at Darlington, it was Ross Chastain. This week at Bristol, it’s Wallace. It’s just what happens when the cars are as close together as they are week-to-week.

Chase Elliott hoping to find more speed

As for Elliott, he continues to be consistent as any. Elliott has yet to finish outside the top 20 this season, with five top 10s and a pair of top 5s through eight races. He sits fourth in the points standings, though he’s led just 44 laps this season.

Yes, Elliott has been fast. But he hasn’t showed the same speed as his Hendrick Motorsports teammates, Kyle Larson and William Byron. HMS vice chairman Jeff Gordon isn’t concerned, however.

“You know, you’ve got to get through the rocky times,” Gordon said last month at Homestead-Miami. “I think hopefully some of their better tracks and better performances. … Again, it’s a high standard at Hendrick, what everybody brings, like the 5 team did today. And so, a lot of times you’re really measuring yourself against the best that there are out there, and a lot of times that’s right in your own stable.

“So, if you’re not achieving what you want to achieve, then you know you’ve got to go to work, and you know that you’re not meeting expectations. So those guys have high expectations, Alan [Gustafson], Chase. It’s not unusual for them to get down a little bit on, ‘Hey, this isn’t good enough,’ but I’ve seen them react really well and positively to that too.”