Hendrick Motorsports and Trackhouse Racing at odds again? Say it ain’t so! Ross Chastain didn’t seem happy with William Byron after the race. Of course, the two NASCAR drivers ended the race when Byron put Chastain into the wall at Texas.
William Byron had a run and Ross Chastain made a move to block. At least, that’s how Byron sees it. Chastain sees it as getting run over and having a P2 finish taken away from him. Instead of a top-5 finish at Texas, Chastain was P32 and a DNF in the Autotrader EchoPark Automotive 400.
Meanwhile, Byron was awarded P3 despite arguably being the cause of the incident. It’s unfortunate that is how these situations play out.
After leaving the care center, Chastain did not feel like talking about Byron. He declined comment and moved on, according to Justin Schuoler of Kickin’ The Tires.
For what it’s worth, this race was great. Especially for Texas. Everyone was dreading this race, but the Next Gen car did it again on an intermediate track. Or perhaps it was the track doing things to the cars, I’m not sure.
Plenty of incidents in this race and Ross Chastain was the final one. It was a hard wreck into the outside wall. I can understand why he is frustrated with William Byron. It was a tough hit and it brings up the Hendrick issues from last season, too.
Ross Chastain gets into it with Hendrick again
Let’s go back to last year. Rick Hendrick felt it necessary last May to give Ross Chastain a call. What was it about? It was about Chastain wrecking his drivers. Mainly, incidents with Kyle Larson on the track in a few races.
So now that it’s Byron getting in over his head a bit, coming in hot off a corner exit, is it a big deal? Chastain sure seems to think so. Or perhaps he is just frustrated in the moment. It’s hard to tell with drivers right after a race. Chastain could see a replay and change his mind, or get more pi--ed off.
All we know is Chastain didn’t want to comment. Chase Elliott went on to win this race, so that might add to the frustration even more. Hendrick wins and you get wrecked by their car to lose your top-5 spot which you fought hard for.
This race tested all of these drivers. Ross Chastain won Stage 2. He probably felt like he could have won the race under other circumstances. Now he and Trackhouse Racing are taking a wrecked car back to the shop with them and not a lot to show for it.
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