Kevin Harvick impressed by confident Chase Elliott

Following a tough weekend at COTA, Chase Elliott walked away with a surprise P4 finish. Kevin Harvick is impressed with Elliott. The NASCAR Most Popular Driver has shown a level of confidence that was perhaps missing the last two seasons.

Since injuring his leg in 2023, things have not been easy for Chase Elliott. He did win at Texas Motor Speedway in 2024, breaking his losing streak. However, there have been concerns with speed and confidence.

Those concerns appear to be gone, now. At least, for Kevin Harvick. The Closer was highly complimentary of the job Elliott and his team have done lately. Coming back from a Lap 1 spin and other issues was more than impressive.

“Well, his team did a great job. You know, they fixed the car up, they played some strategy to get some points there in the one stage and wound up pitting there at the end for fresher tires and wound up with good restarts and made up some track position,” Harvick said this week on his Happy Hour podcast. “Somehow wound up fourth.

“I don’t know how they did that with everything that happened and they worked on throughout the day. But 9 car, I felt like he had a car to win. Lot of confidence out of Chase Elliott. Just the way that he talked about himself and his team prerace and we’ve seen their success early in the season with his confidence and the speed in the car. To come back and finish fourth was pretty impressive.”

Winning the Clash at Bowman Gray might have been the best thing that could have happened for Chase Elliott and his team. Or maybe that confidence was there before and it has since built up in the last month to start the year.

Whatever is going on with Elliott and the 9 team is good news for them. Bad news for everyone else.

Will Chase Elliott be a championship contender in 2025?

This season could look a lot different than the past three seasons of the Next Gen car. Drivers have moved teams, crew chiefs, there have been retirements, and newcomers. It’s hard to tell who will be the most dominant drivers at this point in the season.

Early on this year, we have seen William Byron and Christopher Bell have success on a variety of race tracks. I do expect those two to win three or more races this season. Will Chase Elliott find his way into that group?

With how great Byron and Kyle Larson have been in the last few seasons of the Next Gen era, Elliott has to step up. In that 2022 season, he had five wins. Since then, Elliott has won just a single points race. Byron and Larson have combined for 20.

Chase Elliott has the talent to win a handful of races. But eventually, things become crowded. In 2024, seven drivers won three or more races. Only two drivers won four or more, Larson and Joey Logano.