NASCAR insiders react to controversial Chase Elliott penalty at Homestead, 'alarming' performances

Chase Elliott received a penalty with 98 laps remaining in Sunday’s race at Homestead-Miami for not being single-file while entering pit road.

Elliott and crew chief Alan Gustafson argued the penalty with NASCAR, but to no avail. Jeff Gluck of The Athletic examined the video on Max‘s in-car camera and came to the conclusion that the penalty was warranted. He explained why on “The Teardown” podcast.

“They called a penalty for him being not single-file coming to pit road,” Gluck said. “And then he comes on the radio and is like, ‘Well, I was trying not to hit the car in front of me.’ He was very calm and said, ‘Just have them look at it and I gave the spot back and I don’t know what I’m supposed to do there because otherwise I’m gonna clean out the guy in front of me.’ I thought it was a pretty compelling case. And of course, Alan Gustafson is like, ‘They don’t want to hear it. You gotta go get a lot of grief for this, there’s too many rules.’ … From what I saw, they’re all on their way to pit road and Elliott gasses it up real quick to try to close that gap right before pit road.

“As he’s gassing up, everybody sort of checks up in front of him and Austin Cindric is right in front of him, so he just kind of goes to the left. He gets maybe half a car length up alongside him and he kind of checks up a little bit to give some of it back, but as they enter pit road, he’s not like behind Cindric fully. He’s still alongside him a little bit. To me, if you’re NASCAR, I don’t know how you can say he gave the spot back if that’s even the policy. He got out of line, he gained too much ground and he messed up. That was a penalty. Despite the very convincing argument on the radio, I think when you look at the video, sorry, Chase fans. It doesn’t look good for you.”

Chase Elliott quiet at Homestead

Elliott came down pit road in the eighth position. Once again, the No. 9 car was running well and tracking towards a top 10 finish. But the penalty proved too much to overcome. Elliott finished 18th — worst among all the Hendrick Motorsports cars.

Through six races this season, Elliott sits sixth in the points standings with three top 10 finishes. He hasn’t finished outside the top 20. For most drivers, that would be outstanding. But for a former Cup Series champion in one of the best rides in the sport, it can be viewed as underwhelming when compared to his teammates.

William Byron, Kyle Larson and Alex Bowman are one, two, three in the standings. Byron and Larson have won this season. Bowman was the runner-up to Larson at Homestead. Elliott, meanwhile, has led just two laps.

“That’s not great because it just feels like this year Elliott has been this fourth Hendrick car in a way,” Gluck said. “Bowman has five top 10s. He’s not setting the world on fire except for today where he was potentially going to win the race. … But he’s getting top 10s whereas Elliott you’re like, again, he’s sixth in points but he’s not leading the laps, he’s not looking like he’s in contention like Byron and Larson have been.”

Chase Elliott’s underperformance ‘alarming’ to NASCAR insider

For Jordan Bianchi, Gluck’s colleague at The Athletic, this goes back much further. Elliott only won one race last season. While he finished well, he struggled to win stages and seldom felt like a true contender. That has carried over to 2025 and is “alarming,” Bianchi said.

“This isn’t a 2025 issue. This is a 2024 issue,” Bianchi said. “We talked about this so much last year. You go back — there was like a 20-race gap between stage wins for Chase Elliott. He was effectively the third banana last year behind Byron and Larson, who had multiple wins and were doing the things you’re supposed to be doing. Elliott’s average finish was exceptional… close to the top if not the series best. But it was a really weird year where it was like consistently, they’re running well, they’re finishing well but to your point, they weren’t leading laps, they weren’t winning stages and they weren’t winning races. He’s only won one race in the last — he didn’t win in 2023… he’s got one win in 2024.

“This isn’t a new thing. This is a continuation of how they ran. I would go back even further to 2023, like it was that. I’ve asked these questions [of what is different], and it’s, ‘We’re working on our processes, we’re doing this.’ There really hasn’t been anybody to tell me specifically what is missing. Something is missing though because if you compare the 9 to the 24 or the 5, they’re fundamentally different in terms of almost every major statistical category with maybe the exception of average finish. That’s alarming and that’s not how this should be.”