After his good buddy Chase Elliott broke his 42-race winless streak, Bubba Wallace had to give him a shout out, and tease him a bit. The most popular driver in NASCAR is back in victory lane and he did it on a controversial track.
Texas Motor Speedway has been the bane of many drivers’ and fans’ existence. The reconfiguration has not been a welcomed experiment since 2017. Drivers complain that the repave didn’t age well.
Today we were treated to another chaotic Texas race. It was enough chaos to prevent a single car from leading all of the laps. So compared to a few races this season, that was a welcomed change.
Bubba Wallace halfway joked that now that Elliott has won there, Texas Motor Speedway will be here to stay on the NASCAR calendar. It was, admittedly, not an easy top-10 finish for Wallace who was involved in a couple of incidents.
“Can’t get rid of Texas now… all is right in the NASCAR world today,” Wallace joked about NASCAR’s most popular guy taking the W, Wallace tweeted. Then he got sincere. “Welcome back champ [Chase Elliott].”
Bubba Wallace fought hard for a P7 finish. It is clear that he does not want to come back to Texas at all. However, for the foreseeable future, that isn’t going to change. Between the frustration of today and the heartbreak of last year’s playoff race, Wallace has some ill-will towards this track.
As for Chase Elliott, this will always be the track he broke the streak at. Not just his own winless streak of 42 races, but also the Hooters winless streak going back to 1992. That is a long time for one of the most iconic brands in NASCAR to not have a trophy.
Bubba Wallace building confidence
On the season, Bubba Wallace has three top-5 finishes and now a top-10 to his record. The stretch from Atlanta to Martinsville was a little rough, but he’s managed to get himself back under control now. The good news? He’s going to Talladega next week.
Talladega is another track he suffered heartbreak at. Leading with just a single lap to go, Wallace threw one too many blocks on Ryan Blaney. The two of them ended up wrecking and Kyle Busch went on to win the GEICO 500.
However, this is a track Wallace knows he can win at. He has done it before, albeit in a rain-shortened event. Still, he knows how to get it done. With his improved qualifying efforts, I think he could once again be in contention at Dega.
Bubba Wallace will pick up the pieces from this frustrating weekend and move on to next Sunday. Texas gave us some much-needed drama and unpredictability. Let’s hope better races are ahead with Dover, Kansas and Darlington coming up after that.
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