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Motorsport

Strategy gamble helps Chase Elliott to Martinsville NASCAR Cup win

Chase Elliott Denny Hamlin Chevrolet Ford Toyota Ross Chastain Ryan Blaney Van Gisbergen Ty Gibbs William Byron

For the first time in 2026, a Hendrick Motorsports car went to Victory Lane. Chase Elliott earned the team's 31st win at Martinsville Speedway, taking the lead from Ross Chastain on the final restart.

He then held off a charging Denny Hamlin, who had dominated most of the race and swept the stages, collecting his 22nd career win.

"We took a gamble," said Elliott. "We were going to two-stop that last stint. I honestly think it was going to work out really good for us, either way, but just so proud of the team, man. They put up with a lot, and they got to put up with me all the time. I just appreciate them for sticking with me. It sure is a lot of fun when days like this work out."

Elliott was running ninth before crew chief Alan Gustafson made the call to short pit during the only green-flag cycle of stops, gaining Elliott several positions for when a timely caution came out during the final 100 laps of the event.

Added the winning crew chief: "Super happy that it paid off," said Gustafson. "We were just kind of trapped in tenth spot and it's really hard to pass. We just needed to do something different. Mathematically, it was close for us to either split that run or two-stop it and I just felt like it was worth a shot. When we pitted early, I think it brought a lot of guys down, and that put us in an even better position. Obviously, the caution is great. It gave us track position. The rest is history."

Behind Elliott and Hamlin, Joey Logano finished third, Ty Gibbs fourth, and William Byron fifth. Ryan Blaney, Christopher Bell, Austin Cindric, Kyle Larson, and Josh Berry filled out the remainder of the top ten.

Shane van Gisbergen's oval progression continued as well, scoring points in both stages and finishing 11th after a top five qualifying effort on Saturday.

Stage 1

Hamlin led from pole position in a fairly clean opening stint to the race. At one point, he briefly lost the lead to Byron when he got trapped behind the slower car of Nemechek.

Within a few laps, Hamlin was back in control of the race. He quickly moved through the field, and lapped up to Justin Allgaier in 23rd when the first caution of the race flew.

Just three laps shy of the stage end, Cody Ware got sent around as a group of cars at the very tail end of the lead lap were pushing to get away from Hamlin.

Hamlin won Stage 1 over Byron, Berry, Gibbs, Cindric, Van Gisbergen, Logano, Blaney, Reddick, and Preece.

Stage 2

During the stage break, Kyle Busch hit a tire and sent it flying down pit road, also making contact with Zilisch. His awful day got worse as the No. 8 team was issued an uncontrolled tire penalty.

On the restart, Gibbs moved up to second behind his teammate, Hamlin. Back in the pack, Buescher had to make an unscheduled pit stop, and around the same time, Gragson went spinning a stack-up.

This put Briscoe back on the lead lap, courtesy of the free pass. A handful of cars took the opportunity to pit, but no one up front.

Hamlin led the rest of the stage without much drama, winning Stage 2 over Gibbs, Logano, Blaney, Byron, Cindric, Reddick, Van Gisbergen, Larson, and Berry.

Briscoe was once again the free pass as he got re-lapped by Hamlin.

Stage 3

Hamlin continued to lead as Blaney moved up into second on the long run to open the final stage.

With about 140 laps to go, Elliott and Van Gisbergen were the first cars running inside the top-ten to make green flag pit stops.

During this run, Buescher made another unscheduled pit stop, and Hill was forced back to pit road with a loose wheel. Luckily, it stayed attached and he managed to make it back to his stall. Allgaier also had some trouble, issued a drive-through penalty for an uncontrolled tire.

Hamlin finally pitted from the lead with around 110 laps to go, while Elliott and Van Gisbergen cycled to the front of the field.

Hamlin rapidly ran them down on fresher rubber and reclaimed the lead with 92 laps to go. Elsewhere in the field, Ty Dillon slowed with an issue, but he also made it back to the pits.

However, he dropped debris on pit road, which forced a caution to retrieve a brake rotor. Suarez in 20th was granted the free pass as the first driver one lap down.

The caution made the strategy for Elliott and Van Gisbergen a net gain -- especially Elliott who was still running second. Hamlin won the race off pit road, but he was not the race leader.

Chastain (who was the last car on the lead lap in 19th) did not pit, and took over the lead with older tires. Everyone behind him had fresh tires for the restart, which came with 78 laps to go.

Chastain got a great restart as Hamlin lost second to Elliott, but the run didn't last long as a multi-car wreck broke out in the middle of the field. Wallace got into Hocevar, and a few other cars were involved. Wallace was unable to continue, while Buescher earned the free pass.

They went back green with 69 to go, and Elliott passed Chastain on the outside. Blaney lost some ground after getting squeezed into the wall by Hamlin.

Hamlin got close as Elliott navigated slower traffic, but he never could get to the rear bumper of the No. 9 Chevrolet.

Chastain's gamble saw him fall to 16th in the final running order, but it will still higher than where he was running when the No. 1 originally chose to stay out.

Reddick continues to lead the championship standings, now 82 points clear of Blaney at the top of the points.

Photos from Martinsville - Sunday

RACE

All Stats

Cla	Driver	#	Manufacturer	Laps	Time	Interval	Pits	Points	Retirement
1	C. Elliott Hendrick Motorsports	9	Chevrolet	400	2:47'18.473		7	55
2	D. Hamlin Joe Gibbs Racing	11	Toyota	400	+0.565 2:47'19.038	0.565	7	56
3	J. Logano Team Penske	22	Ford	400	+2.073 2:47'20.546	1.508	7	46
4	T. Gibbs Joe Gibbs Racing	54	Toyota	400	+3.163 2:47'21.636	1.090	9	49
5	W. Byron Hendrick Motorsports	24	Chevrolet	400	+3.704 2:47'22.177	0.541	8	47
6	R. Blaney Team Penske	12	Ford	400	+4.230 2:47'22.703	0.526	9	41
7	C. Bell Joe Gibbs Racing	20	Toyota	400	+7.237 2:47'25.710	3.007	8	30
8	A. Cindric Team Penske	2	Ford	400	+9.049 2:47'27.522	1.812	9	40
9	K. Larson Hendrick Motorsports	5	Chevrolet	400	+9.056 2:47'27.529	0.007	10	30
10	J. Berry Wood Brothers Racing	21	Ford	400	+10.174 2:47'28.647	1.118	7	36
11	S. van Gisbergen TrackHouse Racing	97	Chevrolet	400	+12.280 2:47'30.753	2.106	7	34
12	R. Preece RFK Racing	60	Ford	400	+12.537 2:47'31.010	0.257	7	26
13	B. Keselowski RFK Racing	6	Ford	400	+12.722 2:47'31.195	0.185	8	24
14	C. Briscoe Joe Gibbs Racing	19	Toyota	400	+16.446 2:47'34.919	3.724	10	23
15	T. Reddick 23XI Racing	45	Toyota	400	+18.206 2:47'36.679	1.760	9	28
16	R. Chastain TrackHouse Racing	1	Chevrolet	400	+20.339 2:47'38.812	2.133	7	21
17	C. Hocevar Spire Motorsports	77	Chevrolet	400	+20.866 2:47'39.339	0.527	10	20
18	M. McDowell Spire Motorsports	71	Chevrolet	400	+21.117 2:47'39.590	0.251	10	19
19	C. Buescher RFK Racing	17	Ford	399	+1 Lap 2:47'23.884	1 Lap	10	18
20	D. Suarez Spire Motorsports	7	Chevrolet	399	+1 Lap 2:47'24.038	0.154	9	17
21	E. Jones Legacy Motor Club	43	Toyota	399	+1 Lap 2:47'26.354	2.316	9	16
22	J. Allgaier Hendrick Motorsports	48	Chevrolet	398	+2 Laps 2:47'19.336	1 Lap	9
23	T. Gilliland Front Row Motorsports	34	Ford	398	+2 Laps 2:47'20.893	1.557	8	14
24	K. Busch Richard Childress Racing	8	Chevrolet	398	+2 Laps 2:47'21.437	0.544	10	13
25	A. Dillon Richard Childress Racing	3	Chevrolet	398	+2 Laps 2:47'35.162	13.725	8	12
26	C. Zilisch TrackHouse Racing	88	Chevrolet	397	+3 Laps 2:47'19.753	1 Lap	8	11
27	A. Allmendinger Kaulig Racing	16	Chevrolet	397	+3 Laps 2:47'22.947	3.194	9	10
28	N. Gragson Front Row Motorsports	4	Ford	397	+3 Laps 2:47'23.338	0.391	8	9
29	J. Nemechek Legacy Motor Club	42	Toyota	397	+3 Laps 2:47'25.118	1.780	10	8
30	R. Stenhouse Jr Hyak Motorsports	47	Chevrolet	397	+3 Laps 2:47'25.440	0.322	9	7
31	C. Custer Haas Factory Team	41	Chevrolet	396	+4 Laps 2:47'20.098	1 Lap	9	6
32	C. Ware Rick Ware Racing	51	Chevrolet	394	+6 Laps 2:47'26.643	2 Laps	10	5
33	A. Hill Richard Childress Racing	33	Chevrolet	394	+6 Laps 2:47'27.162	0.519	10
34	Z. Smith Front Row Motorsports	38	Ford	371	+29 Laps 2:47'34.073	23 Laps	17	3
35	R. Herbst 23XI Racing	35	Toyota	323	+77 Laps 2:18'39.611	48 Laps	9	2	Accident
36	B. Wallace 23XI Racing	23	Toyota	322	+78 Laps 2:16'29.993	1 Lap	6	1	Accident
37	T. Dillon Kaulig Racing	10	Chevrolet	298	+102 Laps 2:05'45.496	24 Laps	8	1	Brakes
View full results